Child Head Girl
by rolo197
Summary: Head Girl Rose Weasley is slipped a faulty de-aging potion that leaves her stuck as a five year old. Confused, she attaches herself to the first person she sees, and that happens to be Head Boy Scorpius Malfoy. How will Scorpius cope when he is put in charge of the Child Head Girl? PLEASE REVIEW! xx
1. Chapter 1

Hugo Weasley was well known amongst Hogwarts students for testing his Uncle's new products on fellow students. The affects were always temporary, so he didn't' feel too bad about slipping one of Uncle George's new products into his sister Rose's pumpkin juice one evening. He had no idea what was in the little disovable tablet he had been given, but he knew that it would take 4 hours to take effect, and that the effects would last 24 hours. He couldn't wait to see the Head Girl the next morning.

Rose Weasley and Scorpius Malfoy, as Head Girl and Boy, had their own private common room and bedrooms. The pair were surprisingly quite friendly and had found the start of this year to be quite enjoyable. They would sit and help each other with their homework, considering they shared the same classes, sit and talk by the fire and occasionally play chess.

After dinner, a week into school, Rose and Scorpius headed back to their common room. After following their usual routine of Homework, chatting and chess, the pair headed up to their beds.

Scorpius was alarmed when he woke up to hear a high pitched scream coming from Rose's room. He got up sleepily and walked through to Rose's room to comfort his friend. He was even more surprised to see that it was not Rose Weasley screaming one her bed, but a small child of about 6 sitting on the bed crying her eyes out. The small child had flaming red hair, in an almost identical shade to Rose's, and had big blue eyes. Scorpius knew something had gone terribly wrong when he saw the scar on the child's arm.

Rose had told Scorpius that when she was a small child she had been hit with a stray spell in the wizarding primary school that she went to. Magical would nearly always leave a mark, and so when the spell had hit Rose in the face, it had left a permanent scar. Rose had showed Scorpius the simple scar on her arm. It was just a straight line scar about the length of his little finger, but he remembered that it was there.

Scorpius grabbed his wand out of his pyjama bottom waistband and cast a patronus which he sent to Professor McGonagall. Upon seeing the silvery cat slink off out of the door, the child stopped crying.

"You can do magic?!" she asked excitedly.

"Ummmm… yes?" said Scorpius, slightly over whelmed that this child was talking to him. "What's your name and how old are you?" he asked curiously.

"I'm 5" the little girl said proudly, "and my name is Rose!" she said.

"Do you know who I am Rose or where you are?" asked Scorpius, trying to figure out how to handle this situation.

"Ummmm….. you look like that scary man called Draco Malfoy, but you look too young" said the 5-year-old Rose thoughtfully, "and I don't recognise where I am, but I know I'm not at home" she added.

"Well, Rose, my name is Scorpius, and yeah I look like Draco Malfoy because he's my dad" Scorpius explained awkwardly. "And at the moment we're both at Hogwarts" he said.

"I'M AT HOGWARTS?" Rose squealed. "AM I REALLY?" she squealed again.

"Yes Rose. If you want, I can show you around tomorrow, but first I want you to come and sit with me down in the common room by the fire." Scorpius watched as the slightly sleepy Rose slumbled out of bed. She walked a few steps but then stopped to yawn. Scorpius knew that if they continued this way, it would take them half an hour to get down the flight of stairs to the common room, so he walked over and scooped up Rose into his arms. He felt a little odd carrying the Head Girl down to the common room, but hoped that Professor McGonagall would come and explain what had happened.


	2. Chapter 2

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"Ummmm….. you look like that scary man called Draco Malfoy, but you look too young" said the 5-year-old Rose thoughtfully, "and I don't recognise where I am, but I know I'm not at home" she added.

"Well, Rose, my name is Scorpius, and yeah I look like Draco Malfoy because he's my dad" Scorpius explained awkwardly. "And at the moment we're both at Hogwarts" he said.

"I'M AT HOGWARTS?" Rose squealed. "AM I REALLY?" she squealed again.

"Yes Rose. If you want, I can show you around tomorrow, but first I want you to come and sit with me down in the common room by the fire." Scorpius watched as the slightly sleepy Rose slumbled out of bed. She walked a few steps but then stopped to yawn. Scorpius knew that if they continued this way, it would take them half an hour to get down the flight of stairs to the common room, so he walked over and scooped up Rose into his arms. He felt a little odd carrying the Head Girl down to the common room, but hoped that Professor McGonagall would come and explain what had happened.

* * *

When Professor McGonagall arrived, she was very confused at the sight she saw. Scorpius' patronous had simply said that something had happened to Rose and she needed to get to their common room as soon as she could. She definatly didn't expect to arrive to see a flock of origami birds fluttering around the common room, and was absolutely stunned to see that Scorpius Malfoy was asleep on the sofa with a little red-haired girl sat asleep on his lap.

"Mr Malfoy?" called Professor McGonagall, standing in front of the sleeping boy. Scorpius groggily opened his eyes and shifted Rose's weight on his lap slightly so that she was still comfortable against his chest, but he could sit up to face McGonagall.

"Sorry Professor, I guess I fell back asleep" he murmured.

"Would you like to explain this child to me, Mr Malfoy?" McGonagall asked sternly.

"Well, Professor, this is Rose Weasley" he said cryptically. "I think that her brother may have slipped her something from her Uncle George's collection and it's turned her into a five-year-old" he explained.

"More than likely George Wealsey used a de-aging potion and I wouldn't be surprised if Hugo Weasley did slip it into Rose's drink" McGonagall tutted. "Can you gently wake the child, please?" she asked. She watched with surprised awe as Scorpius gently shook the child awake and helped sit her up in his lap. The child then seemed to remember where she was and politely said to McGonagall "You're Professor McGonagall. My dad said you teach tran….transfig…..trans something at Hogwarts" she stumbled.

A bit surprised, McGonagall replied "Yes child, my name is Professor McGonagall, but I am far more interested in knowing who you are, my dear" she said gently.

"I'm Rose Weasey" the child said simply, "and I'm 5." She turned to face Scorpius and said to McGonagall "Scorp'us has been looking after me" she smiled. "He's 17 and he's Draco Malfoy's son" she said intelligently. McGonagall could easily see why the girl belonged in Ravenclaw.

"Well, Rose, I'm afraid we need to ask you a few questions. What do you last remember?"

"Well, my mummy tucked me into my bed at home before I went to sleep, but I woke up in here, which Scorp'us said is Hogwarts" Rose said.

"Scorpius, I am afraid that Rose has indeed been slipped a de-aging potion… would you…"

"What's a de-aging potion?" asked Rose curiously.

"A de-aging potion makes you younger, and I am afraid that someone gave you some by accident" explained McGonagall.

"So I should really be older, but someone gave me a potion to make me five?" asked Rose.

"You're quite a clever little girl, aren't you?" asked Scorpius, amazed that a five year old could understand all of this complicated magic.

"Yes Rose, you should be 17, like Scorpius. He is Head Boy here at Hogwarts, and when you were 17 you were the Head Girl" said McGonagall.

"What do we do, Professor?" asked Scorpius.

"We must take Rose to Madam Patil up in the hospital wing. We should also find Professor Parkinson and see if she can determine what potion was used on Rose" said McGonagall.

With this, Scorpius stood, and then lifted Rose up onto his shoulders. "It's too much for a five-year-old to walk all the way to the hospital wing at this time of night" he explained I response to McGonagall's questioning look.

So, at 3am, McGonagall, Scorpius and an excited Rose made their way up to the Hospital wing. McGonagall sent her cat patronus off first to Madam Patil and asked her to prepare one of the examination rooms, and then sent it off to wake Professor Parkinson, asking her to come to the Hospital wing at once.


	3. Chapter 3

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"What do we do, Professor?" asked Scorpius.

"We must take Rose to Madam Patil up in the hospital wing. We should also find Professor Parkinson and see if she can determine what potion was used on Rose" said McGonagall.

With this, Scorpius stood, and then lifted Rose up onto his shoulders. "It's too much for a five-year-old to walk all the way to the hospital wing at this time of night" he explained I response to McGonagall's questioning look.

So, at 3am, McGonagall, Scorpius and an excited Rose made their way up to the Hospital wing. McGonagall sent her cat patronus off first to Madam Patil and asked her to prepare one of the examination rooms, and then sent it off to wake Professor Parkinson, asking her to come to the Hospital wing at once.

Rose sat fidgeting on the hospital bed, She was swinging her dangling legs and was humming merrily to herself whilst Madam Patil scanned Rose with her wand.

"It seems that Rose has not only physically but mentally returned to her 5-year-old state" she stated. "The effects seem to be permanent unless we can find out which potion was used and create an antidote."

"I have sampled Rose's blood and have found an antidote which will work. It will take 6 months to brew and luckily, the potion will be effective whenever it is consumed" said Professor Parkinson. "In the next 6 months, however, Rose will still be a child. Her parents both work full time at the Ministry, so we would not want to burden them with their 5-year-old daughter, so I think that the best solution would be for Rose to stay here. This will allow me to keep up to date on her progress and see how the de-aging potion works."

"I agree that Rose should stay here, it will be beneficial for her. She already has an above average IQ for a child and I think that Hogwarts will nurture her thirst for knowledge. When she returns to her normal age, Rose may remember everything that happens in the next six months, and yet she may not. In the meantime, I would like to suggest that Rose stay with Scorpius" said Professor McGonagall.

"You want me to look after Rose for 6 months?" he asked, slightly bewildered.

"She has taken such a shine to you, Scorpius, and I think that she would do well in your care. Rose will still sleep up in the Head Dormitory with you, and attend all of your lessons with you and so on. I will leave you to tell the rest of the school what has happened tomorrow at breakfast, as I shall be visiting Rose's parents to explain the situation. I am sure her mother will understand, she was always the most realistic out of her and Rose's father" McGonagall laughed. "Now, I suggest that you take Rose back to the Head Dormitory. May I suggest that for tonight you let Rose sleep in your bed? She may find it more comfortable to have someone there that she knows" said McGonagall before leaving Scorpius, Rose and the two teachers in the hospital wing.

"Come one then, Rosie, we've got to get you back to bed!" said Scorpius before lifting the tired girl off of the hospital bed and carrying her back to his bedroom. There he laid Rose down on the bed before climbing in next to her. The small girl cuddled up to Scorpius' chest and whispered "Night Night Scorp'us" before closing her eyes and falling asleep.

"Good night Rose" sighed Scorpius before falling asleep as well.

When Scorpius opened his eyes the next morning, he was momentarily surprised to feel and extra body in his bed. He then remembered the events of the night before and sighed heavily. He was responsible for a 5-year-old for the next half a year. He looked down at the tiny little girl in his arms and smiled slightly. Rose slept so peacefully as a child. She had an adorable little smile on her face.

Just as Scorpius noticed this smile, Rose opened her little mouth and yawned. She stirred and sat up, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes.

"Morning Scorp'us" she said cheerfully. "Do I get to see Hogwarts today?" she asked excitedly.

"Yes Rose, I will show you around Hogwarts later, but first we have to get you dressed for breakfast." With this, Scorpius walked through to Rose's bedroom. He picked out two sets of school clothes and shoes and shrunk them down with a simple spell so that they would fit Rose's 5-year-old body.

He helped the small girl get dressed into school uniform before quickly getting dressed himself. He quickly packed his bag for the day before turning to Rose.

"Do you want to go get some breakfast?" he asked.

"Yeah!" Rose grabbed Scorpius' hand and they walked out of the common room towards the Great Hall.


	4. Chapter 4

In the Previous Chapter…

"Morning Scorp'us" she said cheerfully. "Do I get to see Hogwarts today?" she asked excitedly.

"Yes Rose, I will show you around Hogwarts later, but first we have to get you dressed for breakfast." With this, Scorpius walked through to Rose's bedroom. He picked out two sets of school clothes and shoes and shrunk them down with a simple spell so that they would fit Rose's 5-year-old body.

He helped the small girl get dressed into school uniform before quickly getting dressed himself. He quickly packed his bag for the day before turning to Rose.

"Do you want to go get some breakfast?" he asked.

"Yeah!" Rose grabbed Scorpius' hand and they walked out of the common room towards the Great Hall.

* * *

As Scorpius walked into the Great Hall holding Rose's hand, every pair of eyes looked their way, and the hall turned so quiet you could have heard a pin drop. Scorpius took this as an opportunity to speak.

"Hogwarts students, I'd like you all to remain silent whilst I say this. Yesterday evening, someone spiked Rose Weasley's drink with a de-aging potion. She has been de-aged to the age of 5. She doesn't remember anything past this age.

"Speaking particularly to the rest of the Weasleys and Potters, she will not be able to recognise anyone, not even family. The only person she has so far been able to recognise if Professor McGonagall. The de-aging potion used is permanent, until an aging potion can be brewed. This will take 6 months. In the meantime, I would like you to treat Rose with as much respect now as you would have done when she was 17. She is a very clever little 5-year-old, so the decision has been made to keep Rose at Hogwarts until the aging potion is ready. Professor McGonagall has assigned me the responsibility of caring for Rose whilst she is a child." Scorpius stopped abruptly. Rose was tugging on his sleeve. He bent down so that he was at the same level as her before asking "Is there something you'd like to say?"

"Yeah," she whispered, "I just wondered if you could lift me up so I could see everyone." The rest of the student body were surprised as Scorpius lifted Rose so that she was balanced on his hip. Rose looked around before loudly pointing towards her family and saying excitedly "They have the same colour hair as me!"

At this everyone laughed, including Scorpius. "Rosie, they have the same colour hair as you because they are your cousins" he said to her.

"No they're not!" Rose argued back, "They're way too old!"

"Yeah, Rosie, but remember you're meant to be 17, so they're all older too" Scorpius explained patiently.

"Oh. Can I say hi to everyone? Will they say hi back or will they just laugh at me?" she asked Scorpius, but everybody heard. Scorpius knew this and said "I'm sure if you said hi they'd all say hi back."

Rose then turned to face the hall and cautiously raised her hand, gave a small wave and said "Hi everyone!"

A chorus of "Hi, Rose!" echoed back at her. Rose giggled then buried her head into Scorpius' chest, embarrassed, which was followed by a chorus of "awwwwhs" from all the girls and comments like "she's adorable as a kid" from a few guys.

Scorpius then carried Rose over to the Weasleys before saying "I think it would be best to introduce yourselves at lunchtime. I'll take Rose over to meet a few of my friends first so she doesn't get overwhelmed, but we can meet you here at lunch" suggested Scorpius. Although some of the Weasley cousins looked like they were about to complain, Al Potter spoke to them all.

"Look guys, I know this is confusing and inconvienient, but Scorpius is right. We can't overwhelm her yet. We'll meet you here at lunch and then maybe we can go somewhere more private" he said.

"Okay. Sorry that you won't be able to see her now, but I think you'll want to get an explanation out of Hugo first" he smirked. At this, Scorpius left the rest of the Weasleys to glare at Hugo and took Rose over to his small group of friends at the Slytherin Table.

"Rose, these are my friends Leo, Lorcan and Lysander" he said, pointing them all out. "We'll be sitting with them this morning and I'd like you to get to know them better" he said.

"Hi Rose, I'm Leo Nott" said Leo, leaning over the table to give Rose a little hug.

"I'm Lorcan and this is my brother Lysander" said one of the identical twins.

"You're identical twins" Rose giggled, "I can't tell who's who!" she laughed. The four boys joined in with her laughter. Scorpius then said to her "Neither can I, hun, but just call them either name and they won't mind."

Leo, Lorcan and Lysander all looked at Scorpius, surprised. They knew that their friend was quiet, but they never knew that he could be quite so understanding and caring.

"Does she have to come to lessons with you?" asked Leo.

"Yeah, but we have Potions first, so Parkinson should be understanding as she is brewing the potion to get Rose back to normal. But I don't know what she'll be able to do really."

At this point, a snowy owl flew down and landed in front of Scorpius. It contained a brown package. Scorpius had no idea whose the owl was but Rose seemed quite excited by it.

"That's Uncle Harry's owl!" she said excitedly, "He always sends really good presents!" she squealed. Scorpius opened the package and found a Honeydukes Box labelled 'Rose' inside and a large, heavy envelope and another box labelled 'Scorpius' inside. Scorpius handed Rose the box of sweets, at which she giggled in delight at and started to open, and then opened the envelope addressed to him. A large bundle of parchment and a small note fell out that read:  
_Dear Scorpius,_

_I heard from Hermione that Rose has been de-aged by her Uncle George. I've sent her some sweets which she will no doubt enjoy, but I have also enclosed something for you. This map belonged to my father. It is called the Marauder's Map, and shows exactly where everyone inside Hogwarts is at every given time of day. To reveal the map, simply tap the map with your wand and say "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good". To close the map, say "Mischief managed". You can use this to find Rose if you lose her by accident or she walks off. I have also enclosed some small toys like building blocks, puzzles, colouring pencils and word searches to keep Rose occupied when you are in lessons._

_Please look after my neice well,_

_Harry Potter_

Scorpius stared I awe at the letter. Harry Potter had written to him personally and entrusted him with his infamous marauder's map! He looked over to see Rose happily tucking into a chocolate frog, and quickly put the package away in his bag.

"Rose, I'm going to put the rest of these sweets from your Uncle Harry into my bag and you can have them later, okay? Its just that it's bad to have sweets for breakfast and you have a busy day ahead of you" he said to the chocolate covered girl.

"Okay" she simply said. "Can I see the rest of Hogwarts yet? Lorcan, or Lysander, I don't know which, told me that this is the Great Hall where we eat all our food, but I want to see the house common rooms, and the Quidditch pitch, and the forest, and the lake, and the classrooms, and the library…"

"We can see all of that later, but now we have to go and get you cleaned up for Potions" tutted Scorpius gently. "You can't go to lessons with chocolate on your face!" he laughed. Rose giggled her cute, girly giggle and then grabbed Scorpius' hand.

"I want to go to Potions, Scorp'us, so let's go!" she squealed and dragged the Head Boy out of the Hall, much to the amusement of the rest of the school, as Scorpius stumbled and rolled along the floor before stopping a few metres later. He got up, shook the dizziness out of his head and dusted off his robes before saying "I know you're excited, Rosie, but I can't run that fast and I'm not really used to rolling on the floor, so I think I'll carry you to potions so you don't drag me there", and the rest of the student body watched as Scorpius lifted Rose onto his back and gave her a piggy-back ride to the dungeons.


	5. Chapter 5

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"I want to go to Potions, Scorp'us, so let's go!" she squealed and dragged the Head Boy out of the Hall, much to the amusement of the rest of the school, as Scorpius stumbled and rolled along the floor before stopping a few metres later. He got up, shook the dizziness out of his head and dusted off his robes before saying "I know you're excited, Rosie, but I can't run that fast and I'm not really used to rolling on the floor, so I think I'll carry you to potions so you don't drag me there", and the rest of the student body watched as Scorpius lifted Rose onto his back and gave her a piggy-back ride to the dungeons.

* * *

When Scorpius arrived to his potions classroom, Professor Parkinson drew him aside whilst the rest of his class drifted inside.

"I know that Rose is extremely bright at her age" Parkinson said, "But if she gets bored, try to occupy her so as not to disturb my lesson" she said softly.

"All sorted" smirked Scorpius, "Do you mind if I charm one of the chairs so that it is higher? Otherwise Rose won't be able to see anything..." he explained.

"Of course, now hurry into my classroom, we're brewing Ammortentia today as a review topic from last year" she smiled, before indicating for Scorpius to enter.

"What's Ammor…Ammor….i can't say it" Rose frowned.

"Ammortentia, sweetie" whispered Scorpius. "It's a love potion. It smells differently to everyone depending on what they like" he explained.

"Can I help?" asked Rose, curiously.

"Maybe I'll let you stir it, hun, but for now I want you to play with these blocks" he said, retrieving the pile of building blocks from his bag. Rose eagerly set to work building whilst Scorpius got on with his potion. He let Rose stir the concoction several times when it was completely done, before scooping some into a vial to give to Parkinson. Rose inhaled some of the potion and said amazedly "I can smell loads of stuff!", her eyes glinting.

"What stuff can you smell, Rosie?" Scorpius asked. Everyone in the room turned to listen to the Head Girl as she listed the three things she could smell.

"Ummm…. Chocolate….apples..and….I can't tell what the last one is" she said. "What can you smell, Scorp'us?"

Scorpius leaned over Rose to smell his potion. "I can smell soup, new books and…"

"Scorp'us! I figured what I can smell!" said Rose excitedly. "I can smell you!" she whispered before cuddling into Scorpius' arms. Slightly surprised that the little girl in his arms had basically just told him that she loved him, Scorpius hesitantly hugged her back. It seemed as if the class had heard Rose's excited whisper, for the guys sat with their mouths wide open, and the girls had started a chorus of "awwhs" again.

"What was the last thing you could smell, Scorp'us?" Rose asked innocently.

"I couldn't tell, hun. When I figure it out, I'll tell you" he said quietly. He was still slightly in shock about what Rose had said. He was shaken from his thoughts by the bell, which signalled the end of the lesson. "Come on, Rosie, lets pack up and we can get to charms" he said, putting his books in his bag. He cleaned his cauldron with a flick of his wand and banished it to their common room, before lowering Rose to the floor from her chair. The pair then walked happily off to their Charms classroom.

* * *

"What is Charms?" asked Rose as they neared the door.

"It's where we do loads of magic" smirked Scorpius as he watched Rose's little face light up with delight.

"I get to see more magic!" she squealed before skipping happily through the door. Scorpius laughed at Rose's excited antics, but soon sat her down next to him at a desk.

"Good morning students!" greeted Professor Thomas.

"Morning Professor" replied the class.

"Today we are going to be recapping work from last year, so I would like you to successfully use the charms listed on the board". He swished his wand and a set of spells appeared on the board.

Scorpius performed all of the charms easily, each one followed by an exclamation of "woah!" or "cool!" from Rose. Scorpius saw that he still had 20 minutes left of the lesson, so bent down to Rose's ear and whispered "Would you like to try some magic?"

Rose's face beamed as she squealed "You'll let me do magic?!"

"I'll have to ask Professor Thomas first" Scorpius said, hoping that his teacher would say yes.

"Professor? Can I teach Rose one of the really simple spells?" he asked.

Thomas nodded before saying "I'd try _accio_, that's an easy one for a child", before walking over to the otherside of the classroom to check on another student.

Scorpius carefully taught Rose how to say the spell and what to do, before giving her his wand.

"Now, Rose, I want you to point at the feather on Professor Thomas' desk, and clearly say the spell" he instructed.

Rose did as Scorpius said before saying "_Accio_!" She watched as the feather flew towards her into her outstretched hand. "I did magic!" she squealed excitedly. The rest of the class turned to watch as Scorpius banished the feather to the desk again before letting Rose try again. The whole class smiled as the small feather flew into Rose's hand again.

"That's soooooo cool!" said Rose. "Wait til my daddy hears that I can do magic" And Hugo will be really jealous!" she giggled, obviously forgetting that her younger brother was actually 15, not 3 as she thought.

The whole class laughed at this comment before slowly filtering back to their desks to pack up their bags before heading to lunch. Rose gave Scorpius back his wand as Professor Thomas came over and handed the little feather to Rose.

"Keep it, Rose, you did very well today" he said, winking at the small child before leaving. Scorpius then picked Rose up and put her on his shoulders before walking to Lunch.

* * *

When they arrived, the Weasleys were all stood at the door.

"We've packed up some food so we can eat whilst we talk" Al explained when Scorpius looked questioningly at the picnic hamper in his arms. "Where do you want to go?" he asked Scorpius.

"Well, you can always come to our common room?" suggested Scorpius, "No one other than us can get in unless we allow them to, and you guys are obviously allowed" he smirked, before indicating for the red-heads and Al to follow him.

The group trouped down past the kitchens until they reached a stretch of blank wall. Scorpius placed his hand on one of the stones and the Weasleys and Rose watched in awe as a doorway appeared under Scorpius' hand.

"Only me, Rose and the teachers can do that" he explained, before turning the door handle and letting the group inside.

"So, you're saying that she doesn't remember any of us?" asked Hugo.

"No, she only remembers you from when she was a child, so she still sees you as her three-year-old brother" Scorpius smirked, remembering what Rose had said in Charms. "Would you like to introduce yourselves?" he asked before sitting on the floor and pulling Rose into his lap. The Weasley's raised an eyebrow at this, but nonetheless joined Scorpius on the floor.

"I'm Hugo" said Rose' brother. Rose stood and walked over to her brother before looking at him, asking

"Really?"

"Yup." Rose stared in awe before hugging her brother. "I can do magic, y'know" she giggled.

"Really?"

"Yeah, Scorp'us can I show them?" she asked, taking the feather out of her pocket. Scorpius nodded before handing his wand to Rose and putting the feather in his hand, across the other side if the circle to Rose. Her whole family gasped as Rose summoned the little feather and caught it in her hand.

"You always were clever" said Al, before introducing himself to Rose.

One by one, the rest of Rose's family introduced themselves to their tiny cousin. Rose gave each of them a hug before gravitating back to Scorpius' lap. Al reached into the picnic hamper and retrieved an apple for Rose, which she sat there happily munching.

"Well, Hugo, would you care to explain how this weird situation came about?" asked Scorpius.

"I swear, I knew nothing about what it would do. My Uncle George just gives me potions and stuff to test for him. He says they're always safe and that the effects usually only last for 24 hours, but it looks like he handed me a duff" he said miserably.

"Well, we know that the effects of this one are going to last a lot longer" said Scorpius.

"You know I'm meant to be older?" interrupted Rose, "Can I see what I look like?" she asked curiously.

"We'll run back to the tower and grab some photos" said Lucy, grabbing Hugo so that he could go and retrieve photos from the Boy's dormitories.

"I think Rose has some photos in her room" said Scorpius. "Shall I run and get them?"

He handed Rose over to Al before running up the staircase to his and Rose's rooms. He saw one photo on her bedside cabinet which was a group photo of all of her family. He grabbed it and brought it down to the common room before sitting back down. Rose scrambled to his lap so that she could see the photo. Scorpius pointed out who everyone was, except the slim, smiling redhead girl in the front row.


	6. Chapter 6

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"You know I'm meant to be older?" interrupted Rose, "Can I see what I look like?" she asked curiously.

"We'll run back to the tower and grab some photos" said Lucy, grabbing Hugo so that he could go and retrieve photos from the Boy's dormitories.

"I think Rose has some photos in her room" said Scorpius. "Shall I run and get them?" He handed Rose over to Al before running up the staircase to his and Rose's rooms. He saw one photo on her bedside cabinet which was a group photo of all of her family. He grabbed it and brought it down to the common room before sitting back down. Rose scrambled to his lap so that she could see the photo. Scorpius pointed out who everyone was, except the slim, smiling redhead girl in the front row.

* * *

"Who's she? She's reeeeeeeeeally pretty!" commented Rose.

"I know, she really is, isn't she hun. I bet you can guess who it is though" said Scorpius softly.

Rose momentarily thought before asking quietly "Is that me, Scorp'us?" Scorpius nodded, smiling. Rose was so fascinated by this picture of herself. Her brother and cousin brought back a vast collection of photos from their dormitories; there were some more of Rose of her family, a few with Rose standing with one or two members of family, a few of her with her friends. At each one Rose would get happier and comment on how pretty she looked, but those comments soon turned into questions. What is she like? What is her favourite subject? Colour? It turned into a slightly twisted game of 20Q, except that Rose was asking about her future self. It felt slightly odd for Scorpius and Rose's family to answer all of Rose's simple questions.

The group happily chatted for the rest of lunch, but the bell signalling the end of the break sounded, so they all stood to go and face an afternoon of lessons.

Scorpius carried Rose to Transfiguration, and after being awed by people turning animals into tables or matchsticks into spoons, Rose began to get tired. Scorpius knew that it had been a busy day for the excited 5 year old, so lifted Rose into his lap. She presently fell asleep, so Scorpius politely asked McGonagall if he could be excused to take Rose back to the common room to sleep. McGonagall handed him extra work to catch up on before letting him go.

Once they were back in their living quarters, Scorpius gently carried Rose up to his room. He laid her sleeping body down on the bed and pulled the covers over her. Rose immediately snuggled into the pillow and began to softly snore.

Scorpius used the break from caring for Rose to finish his homework, for he knew that when Rose woke up, she wouldn't want to sit around whilst Scorpius set about doing his assignments.

* * *

About an hour later, Rose woke up and ran into the common room crying.

"I didn't know where you were!" she cried as she ran into Scorpius' waiting arms.

"Shhhh hun. You fell asleep in my lesson, so I brought you back here. I was just finishing my homework" Scorpius soothed the little girl. "I will never leave you anywhere, ever, understand. I'll never be too far away, okay?"

Rose slowly stopped sobbing and sat up on Scorpius' lap. "Can we go and see the rest of the castle now?" she asked.

"I suppose. We've got a bit of time to kill before dinner" said Scorpius.

So Scorpius sent the rest of the afternoon showing Rose around the school. As she had requested, he showed her inside each of the common rooms (as the Head Boy and Girl are allowed access in all four), the library, the Quidditch field, the Lake and other areas like the Astronomy tower and courtyard. Scorpius finally took Rose down to the kitchens, where the house elves said they could get them any food that they wanted.

Scorpius only allowed Rose to have a small amount of food, as it was nearly dinner, but nonetheless enjoyed himself as he and Rose sat in the kitchens eating ice cream. After their ice cream bowls were empty, the pair walked back to their common room. There was still a bit of time left before dinner, so Scorpius let Rose into her older self's bedroom. Rose had only been in there for a few minutes that first night when she woke up aged 5, so had not really seen anything. She was fascinated by all of the older head girl's belongings, and had to ask Scorpius what a lot of it was. Scorpius himself didn't know how to feel as the little girl went through all of the things in Rose's room. He was torn between curiosity at the sort of things Rose owned, and the feeling of intrusion at going through her private possessions.

He was presently saved by the bell, announcing to the school that it was the end of last lesson, and time for dinner. Scorpius lifted Rose into a piggy back and started towards the Great Hall. The pair got a few funny looks as Scorpius took Rose over to her family. He lifted her down and plonked her on the bench between Al and Hugo. He knew that her family would like to spend more time with her, but not necessarily with him, so turned around to join his friends at the Slytherin table.

He was stopped, however by a tug at his sleeve. He turned to see a very distressed Rose staring up at him with her big, blue eyes.

"Where are you going Scorp'us? You said you wouldn't leave me!" she cried.

"Hun, I thought that you'd like to sit with your family. I would never completely leave you! It's just that I don't really belong at this table…" Scorpius tried to explain.

"But I want to sit with you _and_ my family" sobbed Rose, hugging Scorpius' knees to try and stop him from leaving.

"Scorpius, just sit here" said Al. "You're Head Boy and you're caring for Rose. Despite being a Slytherin, you're welcome here."

"Are you sure? I don't want to intrude on the Lions" Scorpius frowned, worried as to how a Slytherin sitting with the Gryffindors would be taken by his fellow students.

"Well, I don't care if you're not allowed" said Rose passionately, "I'm saying you sit here, and anyone who doesn't like it can argue with me" she said bravely.

"Mate," laughed Hugo, "You better do as she says. She's just as stubborn now as she is when she's 17. Her say goes" he laughed, before moving over so that Scorpius could sit between him and Al.

Scorpius hesitated, but he was persuaded to join the Lions by the defiant look on Rose's face that told him that he wasn't going anywhere else soon, so sat down at the table. Rose climber happily into his lap and started eating her dinner.

* * *

Word soon spread that Scorpius had sat with the Gryffindors, and the Slytherins weren't very happy about it. Leo, Lorcan and Lysander hurried over to their friend.

"Mate, what are you over here for!?" cried Lorcan.

"Yeah, why aren't you over with us?!" cried Lysander, in exactly the same tone.

"Guys, I'm sitting here for Rose" said Scorpius. "Her family have okayed me sitting with them for Rose's sake" he tried to explain.

"Scorp, you've let a 5 year old rule over you!" laughed Leo.

"So what if I have?" said Scorpius angrily. "So what if I've decided to make a little girl my priority for a few months?" he asked bitterly.

"You're prioritising a Weasley over your friends?" gasped Lorcan.

"That's not what I said" Scorpius argued, but it was too late, the damage had been done.

"What is with you, Malfoy? What, are you like in love with Weasley? Is that why you're caring for her now? So that when she comes back to normal she'll remember exactly how you cared for her and fall head over heels for you? Is that your little scheme?" spat Leo before turning around and storming back to the Slytherin table.

Everyone had watched the argument, and everyone turned to see Scorpius' reaction. He was just sat there dumbstruck.

"Malfoy, if what he said was true…" glared Al from next to Scorpius.

"No!" cried Scorpius, "How could anyone think I'd do that? Rose is now only a child so she has to have someone look after her, and McGonagall picked me! I don't know why, but she did! As far as I'm concerned, looking after a small kid means trying to make their life enjoyable, instead of being selfish and making them unhappy by going against their wishes!" he said, shocked that his friends would believe such a thing.

"You better not be lying, Malfoy," threatened Hugo, drawing his wand and pointing it at Scorpius' face, "otherwise I swear that I'll…"

"Stop it!" cried Rose hugging into Scorpius. "He's done nothing wrong!" she said, bursting into tears. Scorpius immediately hugged her closer, but her family tore him out of his arms with looks of disgust on their faces. Rose was crying her eyes out and was screaming and kicking, trying to release her family's grip on her to get to Scorpius. Hugo and Al, however, picked Scorpius up off the bench and threw him onto the floor in the middle of the hall. Because of the force of the throw, Scorpius landed hard onto the stone floor, and smacked his head on the stone with a dull crack.

And it all went black.


	7. Chapter 7

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"Stop it!" cried Rose hugging into Scorpius. "He's done nothing wrong!" she said, bursting into tears. Scorpius immediately hugged her closer, but her family tore him out of his arms with looks of disgust on their faces.. Rose was crying her eyes out and was screaming and kicking, trying to release her family's grip on her to get to Scorpius. Hugo and Al picked Scorpius up off the bench and threw him onto the floor in the middle of the hall, where his head smacked against the stone floor with a dull crack.

And it all went black.

* * *

The sound of Scorpius' head hitting the hard floor seemed to echo endlessly around the Great Hall. Everyone fell silent as all of the teachers rushed to the Head Boy, who seemed to be unconscious in the middle of the floor.

All of the Weasleys at in shock at what had happened, and whilst they were distracted, Rose had wriggled out of their hold and had run to Scorpius' side, where she was now frantically trying to wake him up.

"Scorp'us! Get up Scorp'us!" she wailed, anxiously tugging at his sleeve. When she realised that he wasn't going to respond she turned around to face her family. "YOU KILLED MY SCORP'US!" she screamed, charging straight at Al and Hugo. She punched them with her little fists, but it didn't hurt them at all. "I HATE YOU! YOU'RE NOT MY FAMILY, MY FAMILY WOULDN'T BE THIS _MEAN_!" she shrieked before collapsing on the floor in tears.

Lorcan, Lysander and Leo rushed over to their friend and tried to calm Rose, but she rounded on them too. "WHY DID YOU MAKE MY FAMILY YELL AT MY SCORP'US?" she shouted, "YOU'RE RUBBISH FRIENDS! I HATE YOU TOO!" she said, and lay sobbing on the floor, cuddling into Scorpius' unresponsive body.

Professor Longbottom crouched down next to Rose before whispering "Do you remember me, Rosie? It's your Uncle Nev" he said calmly. Rose recognised Neville and sprung into his open arms. He then carried her a few metres back, so that she wasn't too far from Scorpius, but wasn't close enough to see the trickle of blood coming from the back of the Head Boy's head.

Professor McGonagall was knelt at the boy's side, furiously instructing the teachers to do different things. One teacher sent a patronus to Madam Patil to prepare a bed urgently, and the others began casting spells to bandage Scorpius' wound temporarily and levitate him to the Hospital wing.

The eyes of the whole school followed Scorpius' limp levitated body out of the hall, with a crying Rose following in Professor Longbottom's arms. The doors banged shut behind them as they hurried up the stairs to the Hospital wing.

* * *

As soon as Scorpius was lowered onto the bed, Madam Patil set to work. She cast several complicated spells to stem the blood flow and remove any internal bleeding, another to stich the open wound, another to repair any minor brain damage and then poured a very strong solution of Skelegrow down Scorpius' throat.

The whole time, Rose was sat at the back of the hospital wing crying in Neville's arms. He was whispering soothingly to her, but Rose was very distressed. Her family had just badly hurt her Scorp'us. She thought he was dead. How could she forgive her family if they killed him? And his friends had turned on him too! Rose didn't want to talk to anyone, she just wanted her Scorp'us to be okay.

McGonagall walked over to the crying child and picked her out of Longbottom's arms and placed her in her own. 2My dear child," she said gently, "I need you to tell me what happened so we can sort this out" she said.

"Scorp'us said he couldn't sit with me at the Gryff'dor table 'cause he's a slyth'rin. I said he could sit there so he sat with me, but his friends didn't like it. They started saying mean things and my family thought that the mean things were right, so took me away from my Scorp'us and pushed him off the chair" she sobbed, "and then his head went crack and he started bleeding and I think he's dead!" cried Rose harder.

"Scorpius isn't dead, Rose, but he is very badly hurt. He will probably be in bed asleep for a few days" McGonagall tried to explain to the small girl. She couldn't really tell her that Scorpius might not be alright, and that he could be unconscious for over a week, but couldn't tell the little girl that obviously adored him that he would be fine in 5 minutes.

"Rose, you can't stay here with Scorpius while he gets better, so you have a choice. You can either stay here at Hogwarts and stay with your family in Gryffindor tower or stay here with your Uncle Neville. It's completely up to you" McGonagall said. In normal situations, she would send the child home to her parents, but she felt that Rose would want to be near Scorpius so that she could check on him.

"I never want to see my family again after what they did to my Scorp'us" said Rose, crossing her arms crossly, "So can I stay with Uncle Nev please?" she asked hopefully.

"Of course, Rosie" said Neville, picking Rose up and sitting him in her lap. Now, I need to quickly sort a few things, so I think it would be best if you sit here with Professor McGonagall" he said, before hurrying to his chambers to set up a spare bed for Rose.

"Can I see Scorp'us, Professor?" Rose asked quietly, yet pleadingly.

"I think he is okay for you to see him, but you have to remember that he can't hear you as he is fast asleep" said McGonagall. She stood and took the child's hand before walking her over to Scorpius' bed. Scorpius had a thick padded layer of bandages around his head, and had two black rings appearing around his eyes. The usually blonde hair at the back of his hair was tinged red from the bleeding and his whole body was limp and pale.

Rose slipped her hand into his and sat staring at Scorpius for a while, tears slowly dribbling down her cheeks, her lip quivering. McGonagall gently tugged the little girl's hand and opened her arms to give the girl a comforting hug. She then carried the subdued girl out of the Hospital wing to Professor Longbottom's chambers.

* * *

After the sad party had left for the Hospital wing, all hell broke loose in the Great Hall. Scorpius' friends turned on Al and Hugo, aiming punches at the faces. This turned into a massive fist fight between the Gryffindors and the Slytherins. The brawl was stopped when Professor Longbottom stormed through the doors. He cast a mass stunning spell, and everyone in the hall froze.

"I AM ABSOLUTELY DISGUSTED IN ALL OF YOU!" he bellowed. "THE ENTIRE WEASLEY FAMILY AND THE THREE CLOSE FRIENDS OF MR MALFOY WILL FOLLOW ME IMMEDIATELY TO MY OFFICE. THE HEAD BOY IS SERIOUSLY INJURED AND COULD YET DIE FROM HIS INJURIES. 200 POINTS FROM GRYFFINDOR AND SLYTHERIN FOR STARTING A FIGHT. ANYONE WHO IS INJURED, GO TO PROFESSOR PARKINSON. SHE WILL CLEAR YOU UP. NO ONE IS ALLOWED INTO THE HOSPITAL WING." With this, he released the stunning spell. Everyone except the Weasleys and the three Slytherins sat back down. They followed Longbottom to his office, where he slammed the door behind them and turned to face them, red with rage.

"I hope you realise how serious this is" he angrily hissed. He retrieved a pensieve from a cabinet by his desk and placed it on the table in front of him. "Put your memories of the whole incident in the Great Hall starting from when Rose and Scorpius walked in. Now." He ordered. Everyone slowly put their memories into the bowl. Longbottom then moved it aside and faced the students. "Everyone except you five" he pointed to Al, Hugo, Lorcan, Lysander and Leo, "can leave. Return to your dormitories and stay there. You will all have detension with me every night, including weekends, for a month. Now go" he said, pointing to the door.

He then turned to the five left. "You five turned on the people closest to you and have ended up injuring both of them. You three Slytherins turned on your friend, accusing him of horrible things. And then you Gryffindors acted upon this by taking the already fragile Rose away from him and beating him to the ground. Then, you started a fist fight in the middle of the Hall, causing many more to be injured. I'm suspending all 5 of you for two weeks. Go to your dormitories, pack some basic belongings and be back here in an hour's time. I will contact your parents to come and get you. Make sure you come back in the right frame of mind" he said, before letting the 5 boys go. He then walked over to his floo network and fire-called first the Potters, Weasleys, Scammanders and the Notts, telling them to floo to Professor Longbottom's office, Hogwarts, immediately to collect their sons. He said that he would explain what had happened when they all arrived.


	8. Chapter 8

**A/N: Hi everyone! Thanks to those who reviewed – please keep it up! I'm afraid this chapter is slightly longer than the others as I just kept writing and by the time my brain wave had finished, I found it didn't split very well….. enjoy! –R xx**

**In the Previous Chapter…**

He then turned to the five left. "You five turned on the people closest to you and have ended up injuring both of them. You three Slytherins turned on your friend, accusing him of horrible things. And then you Gryffindors acted upon this by taking the already fragile Rose away from him and beating him to the ground. Then, you started a fist fight in the middle of the Hall, causing many more to be injured. I'm suspending all 5 of you for two weeks. Go to your dormitories, pack some basic belongings and be back here in an hour's time. I will contact your parents to come and get you. Make sure you come back in the right frame of mind" he said, before letting the 5 boys go. He then walked over to his floo network and fire-called first the Potters, Weasleys, Scammanders and the Notts, telling them to floo to Professor Longbottom's office, Hogwarts, immediately to collect their sons. He said that he would explain what had happened when they all arrived.

* * *

One by one, the Potters, Weasleys, Scammanders and Notts flooed into Longbottom's office.

"Hey Neville" greeted Harry, Ginny, Ron, Hermione and Luna as they arrived.

"Do you mind telling us why we're here?" asked Theo Nott.

"I'm afraid that your boys have been suspended for 2 weeks" said Neville gloomily. All 8 parents gasped.

"What has Leo done this time?" asked Mrs Nott furiously.

"You may or may not be aware that our Head Girl Rose Wealsey was slipped a de-aging potion earlier this week. Scorpius Malfoy, the Head Boy, was made responsible for her." At this, Ron's face turned crimson.

"YOU TRUSTED MALFOY'S BOY WITH MY ROSIE?!" he bellowed.

"Yes Ronald, he did!" hissed Hermione, grabbing her husband back. "He's Head Boy for crying out loud! He must be trustworthy otherwise Minerva would never have trusted him with such a tricky job. How is Rosie?" Hermione asked Neville.

"That is, I'm afraid, why you are all here. The rest of the Weasleys/Potters and Scorpius' friends weren't very happy when he started to let Rose's happiness take priority. They all sided against him and it ended up in a fight which has left Scorpius severely injured." Neville explained. All the parents gasped. "Rose has become very fond of Scorpius and is very distraught that he has been hurt by the people that she thought she could trust" he continued. "As soon as Scorpius was levitated out of the Hall, they all started a fist fight and many other students have been hurt. I'm afraid Hogwarts doesn't stand violence like this, or ganging up on the Head Boy, so I've had to exclude the 5 of them for 2 weeks" he finished.

All of them stared at Neville for a few moments, before all 4 mothers turned to their husbands, saying how they couldn't believe they would do this and how they would have to be punished when they took them home.

Slowly the boys in question drifted in, drooping their heads, carrying belongings and pets. Their parents glared at them before the boys turned to their escorts home.

"Can you keep us updated with how Scorp gets along?" asked Leo, "I never wanted it to end with him getting hurt" he mumbled quietly, before walking towards the fire with his parents. Slowly, the other families left, except the Weasleys, who stood in Neville's office still.

"Who is now in charge of Rose?" asked Ron.

"That'd be me" smiled Neville, "until Scorpius recovers. Rose has become very attached to him, Ron, and I think that as soon as he is better he will be eager to continue to look after her" he said.

"Just keep her safe" Hermione said, before leading her family away. As soon as the Weasleys disappeared in the flames, Harry Potter came back through them. Surprised, Neville stood up.

"Harry?" he questioned.

"Nev, when Scorpius wakes up, let me know. I'd like to speak to him. I would have said earlier, but I didn't want all of the other parents then asking if they could hound him with questions too" he said.

"Of course. Oh and Harry?" asked Neville as he turned to leave. "Do you have to go home quite yet? It's just I'd like you to come with me to tell the Malfoys. I'd rather not tell Draco alone" he mumbled, embarrassed that he couldn't face his old school bully alone yet.

"Yeah, Gin won't notice I've gone for a while. She's screaming at Al" he replied sheeplishly, rubbing the back of his neck. "Shall we apparate to Malfoy Manor then?"

"I'll see you outside the gates in a few seconds" Neville smiled.

* * *

As Neville had promised, a few seconds later, the pair was stood outside the large front gates of Malfoy Manor.

"I don't know how I'm going to tell them" said Neville, nervously.

"Just tell them exactly what you told me" Harry said quietly as the pair walked down the pathway to the front door. A house elf answered the door.

"What can I be doing for you, Misters?" he asked, but Harry and Neville didn't get a chance to reply as Draco appeared.

"Potter? Longbottom? Why are you here?" he asked, his surprise obvious in his face.

"It's about Scorpius" explained Harry simply. Draco's face immediately changed from one of surprise to one of fear.

He then led the two visitors into the kitchen. Draco had remodelled the Manor the second his father was imprisoned. The drawing room and dungeons had been completely sectioned off and he had changed the dark, gloomy interior to one filled with bright colours. He had redone the kitchen, which was green.

"I'm impressed, Draco, you've done a great job at doing this place up!" smiled Harry with awe.

"Well, Potter, I wouldn't still be living here if I hadn't done something to change it" Draco frowned.

"Please, call me Harry, it's not as if we particularly hate each other anymore" smiled Harry. He was right of course. A few days after the war, Harry and Draco had met in St Mungos. Both had been discharged after suffering minor injuries. The pair had agreed that they would start over and start to be friends. Although they were not overly close, they still met up once in a while.

"So, Harry, what about Scorpius?" asked Draco, worried.

"It's probably best that I explain from the beginning up to what I know, then Nev will fill you in on the rest" said Harry. "You understand that Rose Weasley is Head Girl this year, yes?"

"Has he got her pregnant!?" screamed Draco.

"No! No, far from it. Rose was slipped a de-aging potion. She's become a 5-year-old, and McGonagall gave Scorpius the responsibility of looking after her until an aging potion can be brewed."

Neville continued "Scorpius took to his responsibility very well and started to prioritise Rose's happiness before himself, and so when she asked if he could sit with her family at the Gryffindor table, he eventually gave in and sat with my House."

"As far as I know form what Nev has said, Hugo, Al, Leo, Lorcan and Lysander all started ganging up on Scorpius and accusing his of some terrible things, which resulted in a fight where Scorpius was thrown to the ground" Harry said.

"How badly is he hurt?" asked Draco, paling.

"His head hit the floor first" Neville said. "He's currently unconscious in the Hospital Wing with a nasty head wound. We've suspended the 5 boys and are caring as best as we can for him" assured Neville.

"Can you take me to see him?" asked Draco, walking to the fireplace. "Floo address?"

"My office, Hogwarts" said Neville.

Harry, Neville and Draco then flooed back into Hogwarts. As soon as they arrived, the 3 men rushed along the corridors, weaving in and out of the students that had started going towards their lessons. Many were surprised that Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter and Professor Longbottom were literally sprinting down the corridors, but soon got scolded by the other teachers for staring.

As they skidded to a halt outside the Hospital Wing, Neville stopped Draco by putting a hand on his shoulder.

"He looks pretty beaten up, I'll tell you that now," he said softly, before allowing them all into the room.

Draco's face sunk as he saw the state of his son.

"He'll be fine, Draco" greeted Madam Patil as the three worried men walked over to her by Scorpius' bed.

"Parvarti, haven't seen you in a while" beamed Harry before looking down at Scorpius. "How's the lad holding up?"

"He's recovering, I can assure you of that" she smiled. "He's drifting in and out of consciousness. When he is slightly conscious, he mumbles about Rose, and how he has to get to Rose and see she's alright. He really cares for her, Harry" she said.

Draco sunk down into the chair by Scorpius' bed and took his son's hand. "You'll be fine Scorp" he whispered, a tear slipping form his eye. "I know you will" he said, before standing up.

"Neville, I know that I'm technically not allowed to be here, but can I stay in Hogwarts until he recovers?" he asked, looking lost. "Astoria's away for a few weeks with some friends in France, so I would like to stay near my son whilst he is injured" he said.

"I'll ask McGonagall to come here, you can talk to her at once" he said, sending his patronus off through the doors. A few moments later, McGonagall's cat slinked into the Hospital wing.

"Neville, of course I will come. I will have to bring Rose as well, so can you please ask Parvarti to clear up Scorpius a bit – she was a little worried at the blood in Scorpius' hair when she last saw him."

Parvarti did as McGonagall and vanished the blood from Scorpius' head. Moments later, McGonagall walked in with Rose at her side. As soon as Rose saw Harry, she ran forward.

"Uncle Harry!" she cried, jumping into his arms. "Thank you for the chocolate. Scorpius wouldn't let me eat all the sweeties at once though" she scowled.

"Good" Harry smirked. "How are you, Rosie?"

"I'm good. But Scorp'us isn't." she said, pointing at Scorpius. It was then she saw Draco. "Are you Scorp'us' daddy?" she asked, walking over to Draco.

"Yeah, that's me" Draco tried to smile.

"You're sad 'cause Scorp'us is hurt" Rose said knowingly. Draco nodded. Rose then climbed onto Draco's lap, much to his surprise, and hugged her arms around his waist. "He'll be alright" she said into his jumper. Draco couldn't help but instantly love the little girl, even if she was Ron Weasley's daughter. Draco hesitantly hugged the girl in his arms back, offering her support as well as partially comforting himself.

"What's Scorp'us like at home?" asked Rose.

"He keeps to himself mostly. He's a lovely, kind boy and I really am proud of him" Draco said.

"Scorp'us is like that here" Rose commented. "He's really nice to me, Mr Malfoy, he looks after me, and makes me laugh, and hugs me when I cry, and gives me piggy backs, and stands up for me, and he taught me some magic!" she said happily.

"Oh did he?" asked Harry curiously from behind the pair. Rose eagerly nodded before taking the feather out of her pocket. She ran over to the doorway and put the feather on the floor. She then ran back to Harry and stood in front of him. "Can I borrow your wand? Scorp'us usually lets me use his, but he's asleep, so I can't really ask him. Professor McGonagall said I wasn't allowed to wake him otherwise he might not get better, and I want my Scorp'us to get better" stated Rose.

Harry smirked, amused, as he saw Draco's eyebrows soar when Rose said "My Scorpius", but nonetheless handed his niece his wand. "Just don't tell your mum" he smiled. Rose nodded before pointing towards the feather.

"Accio!" she said, before watching the feather fly straight into her tiny outstretched hand. She returned Harry's wand, and saw his face to be absolutely shocked. "Scorp'us is a good teacher" she smiled, before walking back over to Draco again. "Scorp'us is amazing at magic. He can do loads!" Rose said before cuddling back into Draco's lap.

"I have to go and make sure Gin hasn't blown up my house yelling at Al" said Harry. "I'll probably see you again in a few days, Draco. I need to speak to your son when he wakes up."

"Okay, I guess I'll see you soon" Draco said before smiling and looking back at his son.

As Harry walked out, he passed Professor McGonagall, who had been stood there the whole time.

"Rose really is a clever little girl" she beamed before wishing Harry goodbye and walking over to Draco.

"Good afternoon Draco. It's been rather a long time since I saw you last" she smiled. "You really have changed so much" she smiled.

"Thank you, Minerva. I have a question for you, actually. Seeming as my wife is away and Scorpius is injured, I was wondering if there was any chance of me staying at Hogwarts until I know my son is recovered. I really couldn't bear to be away from him when he's like this" he said softly.

"Draco, you don't need to ask. I will get one of the House elves to set up one of the guest rooms. It is nearly time for dinner, so would you and Rose like to follow me to the Great Hall?" she said before indicating for them to follow.

"Your son has been a very caring boy, Draco. You should be very proud of him" McGonagall said, taking one of Rose's hands in her own.

Draco took Rose's other hand and replied "I am. I know he'll be fine, he always is. Who is looking after Rose whilst Scorpius is unconscious?"

"Neville, but I think that Rose would quite enjoy sitting with you at the staff table for dinner tonight" McGonagall suggested quietly, hoping that Rose wouldn't hear, but she did.

"I get to sit with Mr Malfoy for dinner? And Uncle Nev too? And at the teacher's table? That's so cool!" she squealed. Both McGonagall and Draco laughed at this and continued to walk Rose to the Great Hall.


	9. Chapter 9

**A/N: An especially big shout out for MaryLouise1996 as she has been amazing and has been giving me hope to continue this story with her lovely reviews! Also thanks to JustMeMarissa for reviewing as well! Keep up the reviews guys, but don't let those two do all the work! – Rxx**

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"Your son has been a very caring boy, Draco. You should be very proud of him" McGonagall said, taking one of Rose's hands in her own.

Draco took Rose's other hand and replied "I am. I know he'll be fine, he always is. Who is looking after Rose whilst Scorpius is unconscious?"

"Neville, but I think that Rose would quite enjoy sitting with you at the staff table for dinner tonight" McGonagall suggested quietly, hoping that Rose wouldn't hear, but she did.

"I get to sit with Mr Malfoy for dinner? And Uncle Nev too? And at the teacher's table? That's so cool!" she squealed. Both McGonagall and Draco laughed at this and continued to walk Rose to the Great Hall.

* * *

"Good evening" announced McGonagall. "I am pleased to introduce you all to Mr Draco Malfoy, who is currently sat next to Professor Longbottom and Rose Weasley. He will be staying at Hogwarts until Scorpius has recovered. Talking of Scorpius, your Head Boy has been severely injured and the five boys that started the fight have been suspended for 2 weeks. Scorpius will recover, but we are unsure as to how long his recovery will take. You may now leave." She said. The students solemnly stood and left the hall. The teachers also left, with the exception of Professors Longbottom, McGonagall and Parkinson.

"Pansy, I never knew you took to teaching!" said Draco, surprised.

"Potions, Draco. Always did like Snape, so took his place a few years after the war. Had to earn some sort of respect somehow didn't I?" she smiled, "It's nice to see you again, Draco. Keep in touch" she said before leaving the hall.

"I better get Rose to bed" said Longbottom. Rose was currently half asleep in his arms. She'd had a busy and stressful day for a small child. "Draco, you may as well come with us, you're accommodation is the guest room down the hall from my quarters" Neville said. Draco said a quick farewell to McGonagall before following Neville up to his quarters on the 5th floor.

"Here are your quarters for few days, I guess" said Neville, stopping outside a door, "my quarters are just along the corridor so if you want to say hi to Rose or pop round for a cup of tea or something, feel free" he mumbled before taking Rose to the next door along the corridor.

Neville had been shocked when he first found out what his quarters were like. He had access to a large bedroom, a living area, kitchen, bathroom and a small private office. He had furnished his Hogwarts home with thousands upon thousands of photos from his childhood up to the most recent ones to date. He had a large collection from his own Hogwarts days, several from the year that he spent travelling and the rest were a mixture of photos with friends and colleagues.

The only thing that was now different in his room was the small child-sized bed next to his own. The little bed had its own pink patchwork duvet and teddy bear and was the perfect size for Rose. Neville tucked Rose into her temporary bed before heading into the kitchen to make himself a cuppa. It had been a long day with Rose being de-aged, Scorpius being hurt and the appearance of Draco Malfoy, so Neville was pleased that he had an excuse to sit down and read through one of the books he had received for his birthday; '1001 Herbs and How to Grow Them', a Muggle book from Harry.

Neville had just reached Herb 7 when he heard Rose crying from his bedroom. He found her sat upright and sobbing. He picked her up and cuddled her before asking "What's wrong, sweetie?"

"I didn't recognise where I was" Rose sniffed before wiping her eyes with her sleeve. "Is Scorp'us okay yet?"

"Not quite yet, hun, but we can go and check on him tomorrow, okay?" said Neville before setting Rose down and conjuring up a stack of puzzles. "I need to get on with some work, Rosie, so can I leave you to do some puzzles for me?" he asked.

"Yeah, Uncle Nev, but I'll be finished soon enough" smiled Rose confidently, sure that the puzzles would be easy.

Neville left Rose sitting on the floor humming to herself happily as she emptied the first box of pieces onto the carpet, and started to plan his lessons for the next day.

* * *

"Uncle Nev? Are you awake? Can we go see Scorp'us?" whispered Rose in Neville's ear the next morning.

"Waaaah! Oh, sorry Rosie, didn't expect you to be up this early" yawned Neville, casting a quick tempus charm to see that it was 5:21am. "It's the middle of the night Rose, so we can't go see him for another few hours yet" he tried to explain, stifling another yawn.

"But I want to go and see if he's okay now" Rose whined, tugging at Neville's duvet.

"I'll make you a deal, Rosie" said Neville, "If you go back to sleep for now, I promise I will take you to see Scorpius just before breakfast, okay?" he said.

"M'kay, Uncle Nev" Rose said, yawning herself, "I guess I am a bit tired still" she said before sliding off of Neville's bed and climbing back into her own.

"Nighty Night Uncle Nev" mumbled Rose, drifting back to sleep.

"Sleep tight, Rosie" mumbled Neville back, before once again falling asleep.

Just as he had promised a few hours earlier, Neville took Rose up to the Hospital Wing to check on Scorpius. Rose seemed to subconsciously drift to his side as they entered, taking his much larger hand in hers.

Neville stood for a while and watched as Rose started to talk to Scorpius about everything, about how she felt, how she wanted him back and how her Uncle Nev was looking after her. Neville smiled as he watched the child head girl babble on to Scorpius, and eventually had to drag her away from his side to get breakfast, with Rose only cooperating after he promised to let her back later.

* * *

Draco, much to his distaste, had also been woken in the early hours of the morning. Not by a little girl, but by Peeves, who thought it would be very entertaining to drop a water bomb onto Draco's head whilst he was sleeping. After yelling a few choice words at the poltergeist, Draco had been unable to get back to sleep as he started worrying about Scorpius.

Scorpius hadn't exactly looked the best that day, and despite Madam Patil confirming that Scorpius would wake within the week, Draco's doubts had gotten the better of him and he had not been able to sleep another wink for the rest of the night.

Very disgruntled about his lack of sleep, Draco drifted towards the Great Hall at breakfast with the rest of the school. He sat down rather unenthusiastically next to Neville, who was trying to persuade Rose to sit down and eat something instead of staring grumpily at her family in the far corner of the hall. Draco, although tired, took sympathy on Neville, who wasn't doing a very good job at persuading Rose, and leaned across to greet her.

"Morning, Rose!" he said as cheerfully as he could manage, "Do you wanna come sit with me this morning?" he smiled before leaning back and patting his lap. Rose's eyes lit up at the prospect of sitting with Scorpius' father and turned straight to Neville.

"Can I, Uncle Nev? Can I got and sit with Draco?" she asked excitedly.

"Only if you promise to eat something"

With that, Rose climbed across the Head of Gryffindor's lap and sat down in Draco's. McGonagall (who was sat on the other side of Neville and had witnessed his failed attempts to get the little girl to eat) raised her eyebrow slightly when she looked over to see Rose's new cushion, but didn't question it, as moments later, Draco and Rose were both chatting away whilst digging into breakfast.

After they had finished eating, Draco offered to take Rose out of Neville's hands for the day. Neville was slightly hesitant, but eventually agreed when he saw Rose's almost decidedly permanent grip on the older Malfoy's hand. He was even more hesitant when Draco asked if he could take Rose out to Hogsmeade for the day, but again agreed, as he didn't think it was fair to keep the small girl cooped up inside the castle for days at a time.

Draco walked Rose to Hogsmeade, talking to her the entire time about this that and the other. He talked about how he and Scorpius and his wife lived in a big manor in the countryside, and how Scorpius could fly on a broomstick and how he was really excited to get Head Boy.

Much sooner than they realised, the pair had arrived at Hogsmeade. Draco made the very bad mistake of showing Rose Honeyduke's first. Rose stood in awe as she took in the vibrant colours and all of the different sweets that lay in front of her. She ran from shelf to shelf, keen to take everything in.

"You can pick some sweets out to take back up to the school if you like" Draco said, walking up to Rose when she temporarily stopped by a stack of chocolate frogs.

Rose's eyes lit up at the prospect of more sweets, and began carefully picking up little bits of almost everything. The pile of sweets in Draco's arms slowly grew and grew, filled with chocolate frogs, Bertie Bott's, acid lollipops, liquorice wands, sugar mice and quite a few other sweet treats.

* * *

About an hour later, Draco removed Rose from Honeyduke's, in an attempt to stop Rose from buying out the place, and took her into the Three Broomsticks to get her a drink and give her a break from sweet munching. Draco was rather happy to be spending time with Rose, even if she was only small and the child of his old nemesis.

The rest of the day seemed to pass by in a blur. Draco took Rose into more shops like The Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes Franchise (formerly Zonko's Joke Shop), a small toy shop and Scrivenshaft's Quill Shop. He also took her up to see the Shrieking Shack, which Rose was very confused by ("Why's it called the Shrieking Shack if it doesn't shriek and it's a house, not a shack. Surely it should be called 'Another Old House'?")

Rose slipped her hand into Draco's as they walked back up to Hogwarts before asking quietly "Can we go see Scorp'us?"Draco was quite surprised that Rose was this attached to his son, but let it drop, as it was obvious how much Rose cared for Scorpius by how much she wanted to check up on him.

"But you went and saw him this morning. He won't be much different now than he was before breakfast" Draco attempted to explain.

"But he might be awake! He's only asleep, and people wake up from sleep all of the time!" Rose moaned.

"He's probably still asleep, Rose."

"But we won't know if we don't go and check!" Rose rebutted, and at this Draco couldn't see the point arguing any further.

"Fine…5 minutes, okay?" he sighed before leading Rose up the castle steps and up to the Hospital Wing.


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N: Thanks to everyone who has already reviewed! Keep them up! The more reviews this gets, the sooner I'll finish it! – Rxx**

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"But he might be awake! He's only asleep, and people wake up from sleep all of the time!" Rose moaned.

"He's probably still asleep, Rose."

"But we won't know if we don't go and check!" Rose rebutted, and at this Draco couldn't see the point arguing any further.

"Fine…5 minutes, okay?" he sighed before leading Rose up the castle steps and up to the Hospital Wing.

* * *

Draco walked Rose towards the Hospital Wing, all the while thinking. Rose really was an intelligent toddler, as she'd tricked him into bringing her up here. But she did have a point – Scorpius could be awake for all they knew, as Madam Patil had said that he should be awake within a week. Draco was disturbed from his thoughts by Rose shrieking and letting go of his hand, running off.

"SCORP'US!"

Draco looked up and saw that through the open doors to the hospital wing, there was a person with an unmistakably Malfoy-Blonde head talking to McGonagall. He sprinted after Rose towards his son, who had looked up and stopped talking the second he heard his name.

Rose skidded to a halt beside Scorpius, who sat upright in his bed, and beamed an ear-to-ear grin. "You're awake!" she shrieked again before climbing up onto his bed with him and hugging him. Scorpius looked down at the little red-head and hugged her back, happy to see her.

"Yeah, I'm awake, but I can't really remember why I was asleep anyway" he said gently with a frown, looking to McGonagall for an explanation.

"You don't remember? What was your last memory?"

"Walking out of the common room this morning with Rose, going to breakfast" Scorpius said, confused.

"That was two days ago, silly" Rose giggled. She then turned angry and grimaced "My cousins and your friends pushed you onto the floor and you hit your head" she said, hoping that this would explain everything.

"Rose asked you to sit at the Gryffindor table" McGonagall explained as she saw Scorpius' look of confusion as to why he got floored in the first place.

"That would slightly explain this then" Scorpius muttered. "So, what've you been up to whilst I've been asleep, Rosie?" he smiled at the little girl, who was now sat in his lap playing with the hem of her jumper.

"Draco took me to Hogsmeade and I got to sit with Uncle Nev at the staff table for dinner!" she giggled before offering Scorpius one of her sweets for the bag still clutched in her hand. Scorpius then noticed that Draco was stood a few metres away, watching the whole encounter.

"Dad?! What are you doing here?" Scorpius asked.

"Checking that my boy's alright" Draco smiled, walking over to Scorpius and ruffling his hair gently, so as not to hurt him.

"So I got floored by Weasleys and my mates, and now I've got a massive migraine" Scorpius moaned slightly, leaning back against his pillows.

"What's wrong, Scorp'us?" asked Rose, worriedly turning to face him.

"My head just hurts a bit" Scorpius grimaced.

"My boy, lay down. I'll go and get Madam Patil" McGonagall said before running off to get the Healer.

"Rose, why don't you jump off of Scorp for a minute and come sit next to him in this chair?" Draco said before indicating the chair next to him. Rose carefully climbed off of the bed and settled down in the armchair next to Scorpius. Scorpius then slowly lay back down and moaned again.

"This sucks" he groaned. "My head is killing me."

"Mr Malfoy, it's good to see you awake" Madam Patil said, hurrying over to check his temperature. "You'll probably be in here for another day yet, but you seem perfectly fine. You've got 4 stitches in the back of your head, Mr Malfoy, so when I let you out, you must be extremely careful not to break them. If you do you'll more than likely be back in here again" she said.

"So Scorp'us can come back to our room today then?" Rose asked hopefully.

"Maybe, if he can stay awake for the rest of the day and feels better later" Madam Patil smiled, happy for the little girl who was getting very excited.

"Can Scorp'us come to dinner? I want to sit with him again!" she said, smiling.

"Maybe, Rosie, but at the moment, my head still really hurts so I might have to stay here until it's a bit better" Scorpius said quietly, carefully turning his head to face the little girl. Rose's face fell a little, but she soon covered it up by launching into chatter about what she had been up to in detail.

Draco and the two teachers left the pair alone once they had started to talk. Madam Patil turned to them when they were out of ear shot and said "He'll be fine, but those stitches could come loose if he so much as gets bumped into, so he'll have to be extremely careful, Minerva."

"I'll make sure of it" she nodded before turning to Draco. "Draco, your son is better now, so it is up to you what you want to do."

"If it's alright with you, can I stay for tonight? I'll floo home tomorrow morning" he said before turning back towards the Hospital Wing, for he had just heard a scream. The two women also heard the scream and rushed back to Scorpius and Rose.

* * *

They weren't expecting to find Rose on top of Scorpius in a fit of giggles, being tickled by Scorpius. As they approached them, Scorpius stopped tickling Rose and she collapsed on top of his chest, cuddling into him happily. Draco smiled when he saw Scorpius. He really was proud of his son, for all he'd done so far this year.

"Scorp, I'm gonna head home tomorrow if that's alright" he said walking over to him, "But I'll be back the second anything happens."

"Okay, dad" Scorpius smiled, casually stroking Rose's little auburn ringlets with his fingers. Draco once again couldn't be more proud of his son, and couldn't help thinking that one day he'd make a fantastic dad himself.

"I'll go and tell your Uncle Nev where you are, Rose, but I'll see you later, okay?" he said to Rose, smiling at her as she slowly unburied her head from Scorpius' chest.

"Okies" she giggled, sitting up and hugging the elder Malfoy before smiling at Scorpius. Draco then left the find Neville, leaving Rose and Scorpius once again alone in the hospital wing (for McGonagall and Madam Patil had left to go and talk in her office.)

"I've missed you, Scorp'us" Rose grinned before pinching his nose playfully.

Scorpius chuckled slightly before pinching Rose's nose back. "I missed you too, hun" he said before hugging Rose close and giving her a soft kiss on her temple.

"Ewwwwww!" Rose squealed, before giggling and giving Scorpius a kiss on the cheek back. "You only get to kiss me if I get to kiss you too" she smirked before cuddling back lovingly into Scorpius' embrace.


	11. Chapter 11

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"I've missed you, Scorp'us" Rose grinned, pinching his nose playfully.

Scorpius chuckled slightly, pinching Rose's nose back. "I missed you too, hun" he said before hugging Rose close and giving her a soft kiss on her temple.

"Ewwwwww!" Rose squealed, before giggling and giving Scorpius a kiss on the cheek back. "You only get to kiss me if I get to kiss you too" she smirked before cuddling back lovingly into Scorpius' embrace.

* * *

Scorpius woke up groggily the next morning, feeling like he had something weighing him down. He slowly opened his eyes to find that he actually _did_ have something weighing him down. Rose was sound asleep on his chest, cuddled into him, snoring softly. He lay there for a few minutes, running through what he remembered of the previous day.

After McGonagall and Madam Patil had left, he and Rose had laid talking to each other and messing around until dinner. Scorpius wasn't allowed out yet, so Rose stayed and ate with him in the hospital wing. Rose had started to show signs of sleep about an hour later, so Scoprius had scooped her up into his arms and had lay with her in his arms until she fell asleep. He didn't remember anything further than that, so assumed that he had soon joined Rose in sleep.

Rose gently stirred in his arms before meeting his grey eyes with her own blue eyes. "Morning Scorp'us" she yawned, smiling, before she sat up slowly. "Are you feeling better today?"

"Yeah, loads better" he smirked before sitting up carefully in his bed. Madam Patil came in soon after, carrying a set of school robes with her.

"As long as you feel better, you're free to leave, Mr Malfoy" she said, putting the clean clothes on the bed. She also laid a clean set of clothes for Rose to wear next to her. "If you get dressed carefully you should be able to go down to breakfast today." With that, she left the pair to get up properly.

"Can we go to breakfast, Scorp'us?" Rose asked, crawling along Scorpius' body to reach her clothes by his feet. She pulled the clothes towards her before looking up at the head boy.

"'course, hun" he said, before he too grabbed the clean clothes. They quickly got dressed and soon enough they were ready to leave. Madam Patil gave Scorpius a quick check over and handed him various vials of potions for him to take, before finally they were allowed to leave.

Rose hummed happily to herself as she skipped along the corridor by Scorpius' side, her hand closed around his. Scorpius had to go slowly for the first few days, so it felt like it took an age for the pair to reach the main corridor heading towards the Great Hall. Because they had to go carefully, Scorpius and Rose were once again late to breakfast.

* * *

Professor McGonagall stood as Scorpius slowly entered the Hall, a smile forming on her face. Scorpius walked towards the Slytherin table and sat down on the end, so he didn't have to walk too far.

"I would like you all to welcome back your Head Boy" she said loudly. "Mr Malfoy has recovered well, but he is still in significant pain, so I would like you all to be very careful around him" she smiled before nodding to Scorpius. The rest of the Hall gave Scorpius an applause with a few small smiles before going back to their post and food.

Scorpius started to load breakfast onto his and Rose's plates, but stopped when Rose tugged at his sleeve. She saw that she had turned around and was sinking into him for support. He lifted her into his lap before carefully swiveling in his seat, only to find almost all of the Weasleys standing behind him.

"We're sorry for what happened, Malfoy" Lily said. "Al and Hugo were being complete and utter dicks."

"Look, guys, it's fine, I understand why they reacted, it's just a bit of a shock to have everyone turn on me at once" he attempted to joke. He had watched McGonagall's rough memories of that morning yesterday afternoon, and understood what they'd been fighting about.

"But it's not fine, Malfoy" Louis interrupted. "Al and Hugo really hurt you and now Rosie doesn't trust any of us" he said mournfully. As if to prove his point, Rose grumpily crossed her arms and sat back in Scorpius' arms, staring at her relatives.

"Rose hasn't spoken to us at all. She avoids us all and if any of us tries to talk to her she yells at us to go away" Roxy explained. Scorpius looked down surprised at Rose.

"You haven't talked to them at all?"

"No. Because they hurt you, Scorp'us, and they wouldn't have hurt you if they cared for me" she muttered angrily, crossing her arms tighter to her chest.

"Rosie, hun, they were only trying to protect you. Your family doesn't really know me and thought that I would hurt you" he tried to explain.

"But you'd never hurt me, Scorp'us!"

"I know I wouldn't, hun, but other people don't know that."

"Oh...well, they were still bad."

"We're sorry, Rosie. We never would have hurt Scorpius if we had known how much he meant to you" Lily said sheepishly from the side. "We feel really really bad for what happened, Rosie. Please can you forgive us?" she asked.

"Only if you give me chocolate" Rose smirked before standing to hug her cousins. "Just never ever hurt my Scorp'us again" she threatened mildly.

"You've been claimed by Rose, Malfoy, good luck" Louis smiled before heading back to the Gryffindor table.

"Scorp'us? Can you help me back up?" Rose asked shyly, embarrassed that she couldn't reach to climb onto the benches. Scorpius chuckled to himself before bending down and lifting Rose back into his lap.


	12. Chapter 12

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"We feel really really bad for what happened, Rosie. Please can you forgive us?" she asked.

"Only if you give me chocolate" Rose smirked before standing to hug her cousins. "Just never ever hurt my Scorp'us again" she threatened mildly.

"You've been claimed by Rose, Malfoy, good luck" Louis smiled before heading back to the Gryffindor table.

"Scorp'us? Can you help me back up?" Rose asked shyly, embarrassed that she couldn't reach to climb onto the benches. Scorpius chuckled to himself before bending down and lifting Rose back into his lap.

* * *

Because of his injury, Scorpius couldn't focus for long periods of time in lessons, so was temporarily off timetable. His teachers would deliver the day's work to their common room and Scorpius would slowly work through it over the course of the day. He wasn't allowed to do school work for longer than 20 minutes at a time, as it would strain his eyes and make him tired, so Scorpius spent a great deal of time between study sessions playing with Rose.

At 5, one of Rose's favourite things to do was actually puzzles. Professor Longbottom had given Rose various puzzles the day before, but she had already finished those, so Scorpius had to think of things for her to do. He ran out of ideas of what to give her by the second day, so went to Professor Parkinson for help.

She had laughed at his predicament, but had nonetheless handed him a small multi-coloured cube. She explained that it was a muggle toy called a rubix cube and that you had to twist it to get all of the squares with the same colour on one side. Scorpius explained it to Rose, who thought it was amazing, and eagerly set to work twisting the cube round and round, arranging the colours.

With Rose occupied by the muggle toy, Scorpius was able to progress with his work. He quickly caught up on his assignments and was soon up to date with all his studies.

About a week later, Madam Patil removed Scorpius' extensive head padding and revealed to him the stitches in his head. She explained that the stitches could be removed in about 2 weeks' time, and that the scarring would eventually fade, but for now the wound was still quite fragile. Scorpius was also put back onto timetable and was soon walking around from lesson to lesson with Rose.

Rose had become addicted to solving the rubix cube, and carried it everywhere, so Scorpius had no trouble keeping her busy in his lessons. When they were doing practical work, he would occasionally let Rose practice a tiny bit of magic of stir his potion or something just to break up her day a bit.

* * *

Everything was going perfectly for Scorpius and Rose. They would spend the day in lessons or in the library or their common room, and in the evenings they would mess around for a bit, just having fun. This usually meant tickle fights, pillow fights and on one occasion, a paint fight. Professor Longbottom was rather unimpressed when Scorpius told him what had happened, standing before him with Rose, both covered in multi-coloured paint. Neville had bought the set of art materials for Rose so that she had something to do once she had solved her rubix cube (she finally solved it after 2 week's work), so wasn't overly pleased that they had been used to decorate the Head Pupils' common room and the head pupils themselves, but either way he still helped Scorpius to clean everything up.

At the weekends, Scorpius had permission to take Rose out, so long as they were back before dinner. Most weekends they stayed inside Hogwarts, having fun with the Weasleys and Scorpius' friends, who had all become a lot closer once the 5 excluded boys had returned to school, but occasionally, Scorpius would floo Rose to visit his family or hers, which again broke up her week and let her see her family. The only reason that they visited Scorpius' home was that Rose was eager to visit Draco, who she had become very fond of whilst Scorpius was unconscious earlier in the year.

Hogsmeade weekends were spent with their friends, walking around, buying little bits of this and that, and always ended up with everyone pitching in to buy Rose a huge collection of sweets from Honeyduke's.

It was a week before Christmas, and was again a Hogsmeade Weekend, and the large group were heading to the town for a day of shopping. Scorpius, Al, Hugo, Roxy, Lucy, Louis, Leo, Lorcan and Lysander all had Christmas presents to buy, so had left Lily (who had already done her Christmas shopping) in charge of Rose back up at the Castle.

The group spilt off into smaller groups when they reached the village, so that they could buy their presents and keep them secret, so Scorpius, Lorcan, Lysander and Leo parted from the Weasleys and headed to the Hogsmeade WWW branch.

"Guys, I need you to help me find something for Rose" Scorpius said as they walked into the shop.

"What do you want to get her, mate? Sweets? Toys?"

"Well, I was actually planning on getting her something that she could use both now and when she's back to normal" Scorpius said quietly.

"N'awwwwh, Scorp's getting all sentimental!" Leo laughed, messing up the blonde boy's head.

"Shut up. I just thought it would be nice for her to have something that she could vaguely remember this time by. There's a good chance that she'll remember these last 6 months when she ages again, so I wanted to get her something special."

"Mate, do you remember what I said at the beginning of the year?" asked Leo quietly, almost fearfully.

"Yeah. 'What is with you, Malfoy? What are you like in love with Weasley? Is that why you're caring for her now? So that when she comes back to normal she'll remember exactly how you cared for her and fall head over heels for you? Is that your little scheme?', if I remember correctly?" Scorpius said, slight bitterness showing in his voice.

"Okay, I didn't expect you to remember all of it. But now I have to ask you a bit of it again… Are you in love with Rose?"

Scorpius stopped walking and looked at his feet. "I don't know."

"What do you mean, you don't know, mate? Are you or are you not in love with Rose?"

"Leo, I have no bloody idea" Scorpius shouted, before storming out of WWW and heading towards the main street.

* * *

"Scop! Wait up!" Lorcan shouted, running after him. Lysander and Leo followed him, catching up with Scorpius in a few seconds.

"I don't know if I love her or not" Scorpius tried to explain. "I barely knew her when she was our age, but always thought she was pretty and smart and generally she looked like a nice person" he muttered. His friends all stared at him, although they didn't seem particularly surprised.

"Well, we did wonder why you guys stopped trying to kill each other after about 4th year" Leo laughed.

"I just… before, I would have said that I just thought she was pretty, but now I've actually spent time with her, even if she is only 5, you know, I guess I kinda have fallen hard" he said sadly. "The thing is, in two months' time, Rose is gonna take that aging potion and she'll probably want nothing to do with me" he murmured, sinking to the ground. He sat down cross-legged in the snow and sunk his head into his hands.

"Mate, just because she'll be older again doesn't mean she's gonna instantly forget this. You said so yourself – there's every chance that she will remember this. She'll remember all that you did and went through for her, she's not gonna turn her back on you" Lorcan said, sitting beside Scorpius on the snow.

"Scorp, if she remembers everything, what will she remember from Potions?" asked Lysander cryptically.

"What the hell are you on about, you douche!?" cried Lorcan, smacking his brother's head.

"What were we doing the first lesson Rose was de-aged?" Ly pushed, desperately trying to make a point.

"Ummm….. we were recapping last year's work…." thought Scorpius out loud.

"Exactly. We were brewing ammortentia, weren't we?" Ly said, motioning with his hands for Scorpius to think and continue his sentence, but Scorpius was slightly lost, so he finished it for him. "She loves you, mate. One of the things she could smell in the potion…"

"was me!" Scorpius gasped, suddenly remembering the lesson Ly was on about. "But she loves me at 5, when I'm looking after her. She probably won't love me when she ages again though" he murmured.

"But she might" said Leo, before grabbing Scorpius under the arms and hoisting him up. "But we can worry about that later. Let's go and try and find her a chrimbo prezzie, yeah?" he said before dragging his friend away towards a small trinket shop.


	13. Chapter 13

**A/N: Come on guys! Only a few more reviews to go until Child Head Girl breaks the 30 barrier! –R xx**

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"She loves you, mate. One of the things she could smell in the potion…"

"was me!" Scorpius gasped, suddenly remembering the lesson Ly was on about. "But she loves me at 5, when I'm looking after her. She probably won't love me when she ages again though" he murmured.

"But she might" said Leo, before grabbing Scorpius under the arms and hoisting him up. "But we can worry about that later. Let's go and try and find her a chrimbo prezzie, yeah?" he said before dragging his friend away towards a small trinket shop.

* * *

"Little Vintage?" asked Scorpius as they entered the small shop.

"Yeah, it's like this little trinket shop. My dad brings me here every year in the summer and we always try to find something for my mum's birthday" Leo explained. "It's got little bits of everything, but has quite a lot of jewellery, so I thought you could look for something for Rose here."

Scorpius looked around the shop. There were numerous shelves all over, all filled with this that and the other. In a way, it reminded Scorpius of Ollivander's (which was now run by Mr Ollivander's son) in the way that it was arranged in such an organised mess.

Leo walked up to the counter and said hi to the lady in charge before saying, "My mate Scorpius is looking for a little trinket for his girlfriend" he said, "Could you possibly show us where any of the good finds are?"

The lady behind the counter knew Leo well, so was more than happy to guide them between a maze of shelves to a jewellery stand. "This is most of the jewellery that we have, Leo, but if you can't find something, just give us a shout and I can take you through to the store room and we can see if we can find something there" she beamed before turning around.

"Thanks, Soph" Leo called before turning to Scorpius. "You heard the lady, get looking!"

The boys filtered through all of the jewellery on the stand, but Scorpius still couldn't find something that he thought Rose would like, so they found Soph again and she led them down into the basement/store room.

As soon as Soph pointed out the jewellery, Scorpius' eyes found out the perfect gift. He picked it up and carefully showed his friends, beaming. They all looked down and nodded back at him. "She'll love it" Lorcan nodded.

* * *

Meanwhile, up at Hogwarts, Lily was having a nightmare time controlling Rose.

"Rosie, please come out!" she pleaded, trying to persuade Rose to unlock the door to Scorpius' bedroom.

"No!" came Rose's defiant little cry from inside the head boy's room, "I'm not coming out until Scorp'us comes back!"

"Rosie, he's gone out with his friends to buy presents, but I'm sure that he'll be back soon" Lily said.

"Well then, you won't have to wait very long for me to come out then!" Rose yelled. Lily heard something clunk against the door. "Leave me alone, I want my Scorp'us!" Lily assumed that Rose had thrown one of Scorpius' shoes against the door.

"Rose, if you come out, I can take you to the kitchens and we can get ice cream" Lily said, trying a new method.

Lily heard the lock click in the door and watched as Rose's head slowly popped out of the miniscule gap. "Really? What type of ice cream?"

"Any type you want" Lily said, grinning to herself as she had finally got Rose to move out of Scorpius' room. She offered her hand out to Rose and together they left the Head common room to go across the hall to the kitchens.

Just as they left the common room, however, Rose sprinted away from Lily.

"Rose come back! Scorpius'll kill me if I lose you!" Lily yelled.

"It's cool, I can't kill you if she runs into me first."

Lily groaned as she walked up to a smirking Scorpius, who currently had Rose sitting smugly in his arms around his waist further down the hallways. "She's been a nightmare all day. She locked herself in your room and it took me 4 hours to coax her out, and even then I had to promise that you were coming back" Lily said before glaring at Rose.

"I just wanted my Scorp'us" Rose said innocently, but ruined her act by giggling.

"Well, I'm here now. But I want you to apologise to Lily here for giving her a bad time whilst I was gone" Scorpius said sternly.

"Sorry, Lily" Rose said, dipping her head shamefully for getting into trouble. She then looked up at Scorpius. "Have you got my Christmas present?!" she asked hopefully.

"Nope. I knew you'd ask so Leo's looking after it for me" he grinned. "But it's only a week until Christmas, so you don't have to wait long to get it anyway!" he smiled before moving Rose so that she was sat on his shoulders. "Shall we go down for dinner then?"

* * *

As they were walking towards the Great Hall, Scorpius felt Rose squirm. "What's wrong, hun?"

"Nothing, Scorp'us, but I can see my Uncle Harry!" she giggled.

As Rose said this, they reached the entrance hall, and stood beside Professor Longbottom was indeed Harry Potter.

"Ahhh, Rosie, Scorpius, I've been meaning to see you" Harry smiled as he walked over to them.

Scorpius lifted Rose off of his shoulders and placed her on the floor. She ran over to Harry and jumped into his arms.

"Hiya Uncle Harry" she giggled, giving him a hug.

"Hey, it's good to see you, Rosie" Harry said, "But I actually need to talk to Scorpius here for a minute. Can you go with Uncle Nev to dinner whilst I talk to him? It'll only take a minute" he said.

Rose hesitated, but knew she couldn't argue with Harry, so went over to Neville, who took her through to the Great Hall. Harry turned to Scorpius.

"Only Draco's son would have that pale hair" Harry joked, "There's no need to look so worried, Scorpius! I don't bite" he grinned. Scorpius saw that the man wasn't gonna yell at him, so started to relax.

"It's good to meet you, sir" he said, shaking Harry's hand. "I haven't done anything wrong, have I?"

"No, no, not at all! I was actually going to congratulate you. I meant to come and speak to you as soon as you regained consciousness after your injury earlier this year, but I haven't had a spare minute" Harry said. "You've been doing a great job of looking after my neice, and I would like to thank you for it. You put her before yourself and as a consequence, your friends and her family gave you quite a beating for it" he frowned. "Believe me, Al and Hugo aren't going to forget what they did quickly after their mums got to them" he laughed. "Gin and 'Mione went bonkers" he chuckled.

"I'm sorry that your son got in trouble. I shouldn't have really sat at the Gryffindor table, but Rose wouldn't let me go anywhere else" Scorpius explained.

"Rose always has had a way of ensuring that her say goes" Harry nodded. "You really have done an excellent job looking after her, though. Have you considered what is going to happen when she returns to her normal age?" he asked.

"I have thought a little, but not loads" Scorpius said. "I'm just worried that she'll forget about me as soon as she's back to normal" he admitted.

Scorpius was surprised when Harry started to laugh. "Rosie won't forget you, Scorpius. It's obvious that she's completely in love with you at her current age, and she's not going to turn around and ignore you" the older man said. "Just wait and see what happens. Now, what are you doing about the Christmas Holidays?"

"I don't know, sir. Rose won't leave my side for less than 5 minutes without kicking up a fuss, so I was gonna stay here with her" Scorpius said.

"What about seeing your family?"

"I don't think Ron Weasley would appreciate it if Rose spent Christmas at Malfoy Manor" Scorpius said honestly.

"Well, you're right about Rose not leaving your side, but her family won't be very pleased if they don't see her over Christmas" Harry said thoughtfully. "How about you spend half of the holidays with your family at Malfoy Manor and spend the other half with us?"

"Sorry?!" Scorpius said, eyes bulging at the suggestion.

"Spend the first half of the holidays with your family, as I heard that Rose quite likes your dad too, and then come and stay with the Weasleys at the Burrow for the rest of the hols" Harry repeated. "I'll guarantee that Rose will enjoy it more, plus Ron can't kill you if I suggest it" he laughed. "You can sleep at the Burrow with all of the kids and then Rose can come and stay at yours."

"I'd really like that, sir, if you're sure no one would mind a Malfoy joining the Weasley Christmas" Scorpius grinned. "I'll just have to owl my dad about it, but he'll be fine with it all."

"Well, then I'll see you at Kings Cross in a few day's time" Harry smiled. "Now, let's go find my trouble-of-a-neice."

* * *

As Scorpius and Harry entered, Rose stood up from where she was sat with all of her cousins and ran full pelt towards them.

"What did Uncle Harry say, Scorp'us?" she asked excitedly.

"He just wanted to invite us home for Christmas" Scorpius grinned before picking Rose off of the floor and into his arms. "Shall we go and have dinner then, hun?"

Harry watched as Scorpius carried Rose happily towards all of his nieces and nephews and was amazed at how easily they all got along. Harry walked towards then and joined them at the Gryffindor table.

"I haven't sat here in years" he said, looking up and down the table.

"Urgh, Dad's reminiscing" Al groaned before asking Scorpius "So, dad invited you to have a Weasley Christmas, huh?"


	14. Chapter 14

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"He just wanted to invite us home for Christmas" Scorpius grinned before picking Rose off of the floor and into his arms. "Shall we go and have dinner then, hun?"

Harry watched as Scorpius carried Rose happily towards all of his nieces and nephews and was amazed at how easily they all got along. Harry walked towards then and joined them at the Gryffindor table.

"I haven't sat here in years" he said, looking up and down the table.

"Urgh, Dad's reminiscing" Al groaned before asking Scorpius "So, dad invited you to have a Weasley Christmas, huh?"

* * *

A week later, Scorpius held Rose's hand as they walked down to the carriages, his suitcase containing not only his belongings, but Rose's also, in his other hand.

Rose, at 5, had never been on either the carriages or the scarlet steam train, so was over excited about it all. She once again, seemed to have an unending list of questions up her sleeve.

"What pulls the carriages?"

"How big is the train?"

"What colour is the train?"

"Will you sit with my family?"

"How long will it take?"

"Is the station really a muggle bulding?"

"Do you ever stop asking questions?" Scorpius groaned slightly, looking down at Rose. They were queuing up to get into the carriages, and Rose's questions were beginning to try his patience a bit. "The carriages are pulled by creatures called Thestrals and they can only be seen by special people like me" he said.

At age 7, Scorpius had watched his Granddad Greengrass pass away in a St Mungo's bed from cancer, so could see the beasts. "Before you ask, it's hard to describe what they look like, but they've got a grey skin and look a bit like a shaved Hippogryff" he tried to explain.

"The train is red, and it's really long, so you should stay with me all the time when you're on it. Of course I'll come and sit with your family, as we're kinda going home with them, so I need to stay with them to find your family" he said, smirking a bit at the thought of a Malfoy spending Christmas with the Weasleys and a Weasley spending Christmas with the Malfoys.

"It'll take a few hours to get there, but we've got loads of things to do, and yeah, Kings Cross is a muggle place, so you'll have to be careful as to what you say when we leave the station" he finished.

* * *

Rose gasped as the carriage they were on rounded the corner and gave her her first view of the Hogwarts Express. "It's so big!"

"Come one, Rosie, stop admiring the train. We need to get on otherwise it'll leave without us!" Al called from one of the open doorways. Rose and Scorpius walked towards him and followed him further down the carriage to the Weasley compartment.

The trio walked into the compartment to find that everyone was playing a huge game of explosive snap.

"I love this game!" Rose giggled. "Can me and Scorp'us play?"

"Yeah" said Hugo, dealing out another set of cards for Rose and Scorpius, "But for now, you work with Scorpius instead of by yourself as you've got to remember that we're all a lot faster than you now so you might get your fingers burnt" he grinned.

Two hours and about 20 games of exploding snap later, the trolley lady came round. Of course, everyone was getting hungry, so grabbed loads of goodies. Scorpius grabbed a few pumpkin pasties along with some other sweets and offered some to Rose. He put two pumpkin pasties into his bag for later.

After eating lots of sweets, all of the teens and Rose were all getting pretty high on sugar rushes. They played loads of small games like hangman and wizard's chess in teams and before long, Rose began to tire.

After about half an hour of yawning, Rose finally fell asleep on Scorpius' lap, leaving the teens to finally talk normally.

"Now that Rose is asleep, what do you want to do?" asked Scorpius.

"We don't really know that much about you, Scorpius, despite the fact that you've been hanging around with us since September" Al said. "Would you mind telling us more about yourself?"

"Well, I'm Scorpius Malfoy, Head Boy, Slytherin, if that helps" he smirked sarcastically. "Okay, okay, I'll tell you lot my life story.

"I live with my parents and my grandmother in the refurbished Malfoy Manor. My granddad died in Azkaban years ago, but I barely ever saw him anyway. I had quite a lonely childhood as my parents preferred to avoid busy places as they would get attacked quite a lot, so I never had the opportunity to talk to people my age.

"My dad taught me how to ride a broom and use a wand when I turned 8. He only taught me this so that if I was ever in trouble, I'd be able to get away or get help" he explained.

"On the train to Hogwarts in first year, everyone stared and I ended up sitting alone in the corridor for the whole journey as no one would let me sit with them and all the compartments were occupied. I only really made friends with my housemates and didn't really see anyone else.

"I was selected to join the Quidditch team in second year, but had to quit the team after a Gryffindor beater smashed my face in with his beater's bat. I stayed in the hospital wing for 2 weeks recovering from concussion, amnesia and a broken nose."

"That was Fred. Sorry about that" Al frowned.

"Anyway, you know that up to about 4th year me and Rose constantly had a competition running between us so I got into plenty of trouble at her expense. From 5th year onwards, the teachers started to pair us up for work so we sort of developed a neutral friendship. I passed my 12 OWLS with Os, identical results to Rose, and was made a prefect and then Head Boy. And that's about it really" Scorpius finished.

"Well, you're not too bad then" Hugo nodded before leaning back in his seat. "What do you want to be when you leave school?"

"Transfiguration Teacher."

"Really? Always had you pegged for a Potions guy…"

"Nope, transfiguration."

"Rose wants to teach Charms, did you know that?" Al asked.

"No, I didn't, but she always did amazingly well in charms so it makes sense."

"We're almost at the station" Lily commented from her window seat, "Scorpius, you might want to wake Rose."

All of the Weasleys watched as Scorpius gently started to shake Rose awake.

"Rosie, hun, we're nearly here, so you have to wake up, hun" he said, gently shaking Rose's shoulder. Her eyes snapped open.

"We're nearly here!?" she asked excitedly

"Yes, so you need to wake up a bit."

Minutes later, the train pulled up in Kings Cross Station. The Weasleys, Potters and Scorpius and Rose all walked out onto the platform together and soon spotted their parents. Scorpius hesitantly walked over with them, slightly lagging.

"It's good to see you, Scorpius" Harry grinned, standing with his arm around his wife's waist. "Right, everyone hold onto a parent! We'll apparate you all to the Burrow."

* * *

**A/N: Whilst I have your attention, please review before you leave! I really would love to hear from more people, and would love you all even more if we broke the 40 (and maybe this is abitious..) and maybe even the 50 review barriers! Keep reading and reviewing! - Rxx**


	15. Chapter 15

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"We're nearly here!?" she asked excitedly

"Yes, so you need to wake up a bit."

Minutes later, the train pulled up in Kings Cross Station. The Weasleys, Potters and Scorpius and Rose all walked out onto the platform together and soon spotted their parents. Scorpius hesitantly walked over with them, slightly lagging.

"It's good to see you, Scorpius" Harry grinned, standing with his arm around his wife's waist. "Right, everyone hold onto a parent! We'll apparate you all to the Burrow."

* * *

Scorpius' first impression of the Burrow was that it was definitely a family home. The house seemed to come alive the second people came into it. The crooked house was almost certainly held up by magic, as it now had a few extra floors added to it. As they all arrived in the snowy yard, a bumbling aging woman came out of the door, calling to them all.

"Ah, my dears! It's good to see you all got here alright!" she beamed. "You must be Draco Malfoy's boy! I've been hearing a lot of good things about you!" she said, walking up to Scorpius and giving him a motherly hug.

"Oh, you have?" he asked, surprised.

"Of course, Rosie talks about you a lot, and Harry's been telling me a bit about you considering you were coming to stay. So, where is my little Rosie?" she asked, before catching sight of Rose who was holding Scorpius' hand.

"Granny!" she said, hugging Mrs Weasley.

"Hello deary. Now, let's all get inside before we all freeze" she said, taking Rose's hand and helping her trek through the thick snow back to the house.

"Molly can be a bit head strong" Scorpius heard Harry whisper into his ear. "She's right you know, Rosie did use to talk quite a bit about you" he said, walking past Scorpius beaming.

Scorpius slightly lagged behind everyone as they walked inside. Rose really spoke about him to her family?

As he entered the Burrow, Scorpius felt Rose attach herself to his side again. She looked up at Scorpius, who subconsciously picked her up and balanced her on his waist. He then looked up as he heard the sound of 16 Weasley jaws hitting the ground. Ginny and James Potter, George, Angelina, Fred, Percy, Audrey, Molly, Charlie, Bill, Fleur, Victoire, Teddy, Dominique, Mr and Mrs Weasley were all staring at him with wide eyes and gaping mouths.

Teddy broke the silence by introducing himself. "You're Scorpius, yeah? I'm Teddy Lupin. I'm related to you in some way or another – I'm your dad's cousin" he said, scratching his head.

"So you're my second cousin then" Scorpius said, working out the family connections.

"Yeah, and this is my fiancé Victoire" he said as Victoire joined his side.

"It's great to meet you, Scorpius" she said before glancing at Rose. "She's very attached to you" she smiled.

"Doesn't leave me alone" he grinned before glancing down at Rose who was leaning into his chest. One by one, the rest of the Weasleys introduced themselves. Al told him that every Christmas the entire family stayed at the Burrow, which is why there were now at least 8 floors to the house.

Scorpius gulped slightly as Fred and James came over to him. "Well Malfoy, it seems Rosie quite likes you" Fred smirked.

"So I guess we'll try not to intentionally hurt you whilst you're here" James grinned.

"Oh yeah, and I guess I'm a bit sorry for smashing your face in that Quidditch game a few years ago" Fred said before the pair walked off, no doubt to cause trouble.

After all the introductions, Scorpius and Rose sat on the couch in front of the fire with Rose and the Weasley children who were still at Hogwarts talking and playing games until it was time for bed. Scorpius was going to sleep on the 7th floor with the boys, whilst Rose was sleeping the next floor down with all of the girls. Rose was slightly confused as to why she couldn't stay with Scorpius, but nevertheless joined the girls when Scorpius quietly said that it was only for a few days and that it would be like a sleepover. Scorpius and the guys stayed awake mucking around until about 1am when they crashed, and Scorpius actually started to think he was going to enjoy this Christmas.

* * *

Scorpius was shaken awake about 2 hours later by Lily, who was dressed in a dressing gown and slippers. "What's going on?" he muttered sleepily, sitting up.

"Rose woke up with a nightmare screaming. She won't stop crying" Lily said.

"Ah crap" he moaned.

"She kept telling us to come and get you, so after half an hour of crying I was sent to come and wake you up" she explained. "We really did try to get her to stop crying and go back to sleep as we knew the boys would keep you up" she glowered at the sleeping boys who were starting to drift awake at the talking, "But we really need you to comfort her."

"I'll come, just give me a second to wake up a bit" he nodded, slowly sitting up and standing. He then followed Lily down the stairs and opened the door to be faced with sobbing.

Rose looked up as the door opened and flung herself into Scorpius' arms, who immediately started comforting her. He sat down cross-legged on the floor and drew Rose into his lap, letting her cry into his chest.

"Nightmares again?" he asked softly. Rose nodded. Scorpius gently stroked her hair and hushed "It's alright hun, I'm here, nothing can get you, you're safe" into her ear. All of the girls in the bedroom quietly watched as Rose promptly fell asleep in Scorpius' lap.

"Is she gonna wake up again?" Lily asked.

"She might" he said. "Look, this sounds weird, but she always ends up in my bed after nightmares, so she might wake up again."

"How often does she have nightmares?" Lily asked curiously.

"Every night, really. In the end I gave up putting her into her own bed and just stuck her in with me" he sheepishly confessed.

"Doesn't she wake you up screaming?"

"No actually. I guess she's stopped having them since I let her share my bed" Scorpius thought aloud.

"Right, you're staying here then" Lily said, walking over to him with a pillow and a sleeping bag. "If she doesn't wake up screaming when she's with you, then you can stay here for the night" she said. "I'll talk to Aunt Hermione and see if she'll agree to letting Rose camp upstairs with you and the boys tomorrow" she said before grabbing her own pillow and sleeping bag and dragging it over to where Scorpius was sat.

"Thanks Lily, you don't have to let me stay. Are you sure Rose's dad won't castrate me in the morning if he find out?" Scorpius asked, paling slightly at the thought.

"Not if I can help it. Rose woke us all up and these girls love their beauty sleep" she laughed. A chorus of 'piss of, lils', 'shut up lily' and 'go to bloody bed' echoed around the room from the girls who were still awake after being woken by Rose. Both Lily and Scorpius laughed quietly as they settled down next to each other to go back to sleep. Rose curled up next to Scorpius and soon enough was lying completely on top of him, hugging him in her sleep. Lil smiled as Scorpius laid back, put one arm under his head and wrapped the other around Rose before falling asleep. _Malfoy might have been a pain, but he sure can be nice_, she thought as she drifted to sleep.

* * *

The next morning, Scorpius woke up to find that all of the girls were awake and staring down at him. He was a bit surprised to have Lily, Roxy, Dominique, Victoire, Molly and Lucy staring down at him, but was completely shocked as Rose leapt on top of him. His gasp turned into a groan as he adjusted to having Rose throw her whole body onto his stomach.

"Good morning to you too" he said, rubbing his chest groggily.

"Morning, Scorp'us!" Rose cried. "Lily said she'll take us down to the pond later. It's covered in ice and she thinks we can skate on it!" she babbled excitedly.

"That'll be nice" he smiled. "Rosie, can you let me up please? I need to go and get dressed if we're going outside" he grinned. Rose gently climbed off of him and let him stand. He shook the sleep out of him and began walking towards the door when Lily suddenly called him back.

"Scorp, we don't have anything for Rose to wear…you've still got all her clothes" she said.

"Oh. Do you want me to take her and get her dressed? You guys probably wouldn't mind getting some more sleep. Don't worry, I'll keep her inside until everyone's up" he promised. Rose didn't even wait for Lily to answer before grabbing Scorpius' hand and dragging him out of the room, crying "let's go, Scorp'us!" The 6 girls giggled as they watched the tall blonde boy stumble out of the room and heard him trip on the stairs.

"He's so sweet" Dom commented. "Is he normally like this?"

"I've never noticed it, but yes" Lucy said.

"I think he had a crush on Rose when she was 17" Victoire said. Everyone turned to her.

"It's in his eyes. You can tell" Lily nodded. "And I'd say it's not a crush, I'd say he's totally in love with her" she smiled.

"We've got to figure out a way to get them together when Rose is aged again" Roxy agreed.

"That'll be easy, Rosie's had a crush on Scorp for years" Lily giggled. "No one else noticed this?" Evidently they had not, as they tilted their heads to the side and stared at her quizzically. "She was always talking about him, and when she went back she wasn't worried about him sharing a dorm with her, she actually looked like she was looking forward to it" she said. "Also, she is always watching him"

"Who wouldn't when he's got such a fine arse?" Roxy interupted, grinning. "I bet they'll be together by Valentine's Day" she said.

"When's she getting aged again?" Victoire asked.

"1st February" Lily said. "two weeks though…I reckon they'll be together by the end of the day on February the 1st!" she smirked.

"I dunno about you guys, but that fine piece of arse has taken Rose off our hands for an hour or two, so who fancies catching up on sleep?" Dom laughed before curling up in her sleeping bag again. The girls all nodded in agreement and were soon huddled together in their sleeping bags.

"Sweet Dreams, everyone" Victoire said, "just focus on Scorpius' amazing arse and you'll sleep well" she giggled, and was soon joined by the rest of the girls in laughter.

* * *

**A/N: Nawwwwh I love writing this... keep reviewing! Let's try and get this up to 50 reviews, huh? The more reviews this gets the faster i can update, and that's a promise! - Rxx**


	16. Chapter 16

**A/N: A big thank you to the amazing MaryLousie1996 and scifichick07 who reviewed today - you literally made my day! Hope everyone else keeps reviewing and enjoy! - Rxx**

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"I dunno about you guys, but that fine piece of arse has taken Rose off our hands for an hour or two, so who fancies catching up on sleep?" Dom laughed before curling up in her sleeping bag again. The girls all nodded in agreement and were soon huddled together in their sleeping bags.

"Sweet Dreams, everyone" Victoire said, "just focus on Scorpius' amazing arse and you'll sleep well" she giggled, and was soon joined by the rest of the girls in laughter.

* * *

Scorpius pulled Rose to him as they approached the door to the room where him, Al, Hugo, Louis, Fred, James and Teddy were sleeping. "Rosie, we'll have to be quiet when we go in as the others will still be asleep." Rose nodded and motioned that her mouth would stay sealed, giggling quietly, so Scorpius softly opened the door.

He yelped as for the second time in the last 10 minutes, someone had leaped on top of him, Rose squealed as Scorpius was tackled to the ground by an orange blur.

"Where've you been, huh?" Fred cried, sitting on top of a bewildered Scorpius.

"Where've you been Malfoy? You been playing dirty with one of our cousins?" James said, standing behind Fred, staring down at him.

"No! I got dragged out by Lily at 3 to go and calm Rose down!" Scorpius choked, struggling to breathe as Fred crushed him slowly.

"Get off, Fred" Al muttered, irritated. "Scorp wouldn't do something like that. I heard him talking to Lils this morning when she woke him up. Rose woke all the girls up screaming and asked for Scorp so lils came and got him."

"Why didn't you come back, then?" Fred snarled.

"Lily told me I could stay when Rose fell asleep on me. She doesn't have nightmares when she's with me" Scorpius tried to explain. Fred and James seemed to relax a bit at this, but Fred's head jerked down as a resounding crack rang around the room.

"Get off my Scorp'us!" Rose yelled, slapping Fred in the back of the head again. "He's going purple!" she said. She shoved Fred off of Scorpius' chest and lay down on top of him, staring into his eyes. "Are you alright?" she asked, tears forming in her eyes at the prospect of Scorpius being hurt again.

"I'm good, hun" Scorpius said, sitting up and coughing slightly. "Just a bit out of breath from having two people jump on me this morning" he said, smirking at Rose who was sat in his lap again.

"Can we get dressed now so we can go outside in the snow?" Rose asked, suddenly remembering it was snowy outside.

"We can get dressed but it's still a bit early to go out in the snow, but I can find you some breakfast" Scorpius smiled, lifting Rose off of him before standing up. "Come on, let's find you something to wear."

Hugo and Al followed Scorpius and Rose over to his rucksack, which contained all of his magically shrunken clothes. "I didn't know Rose had some clothes as a 5-year-old" Hugo muttered.

"She doesn't. I shrunk a few bits of her normal teenage wardrobe down for her" Scorpius said, "But she doesn't have any jumpers so I was gonna shrink down one of my jumpers or one of the girls' coats for her" he explained, digging out a t shirt, underwear and jeans for Rose. He handed them to her and said "You go and change into these while I find some more layers for you" he smiled. As Rose ran off, he plunged his hand into his bag again and pulled out a shrunken dark blue jumper. He shrunk it down in size and put it aside for Rose before grabbing out some clothes for himself. He quickly chucked on a shirt, sweatshirt and some trackies, moments before Rose came back in.

"I've got you a jumper, Rosie. Can you try it on for me so I can see if it fits?" he said, giving his jumper to Rose. As she put it on, Scorpius cast a spell to make it a little smaller and then grabbed her hand. "Al, Hugo, I'll take Rose downstairs and get her some breakfast. Do you guys want to join us in a bit?"

"Yeah, we'll just get up. Try not to give in and let her out yet – we'll have to find one of Lily's spare coats or something first" Al grinned.

Scorpius took Rose's hand and led her downstairs. As they passed the girl's room, Lily came out fully dressed and joined them. "The others went back to sleep, but I figured you'll need some help with entertaining Rose" she smiled. "I like her jumper. Where'd it come from?" she asked.

"It's one of Scorp'us'!" Rose giggled. "He made it my size. It's really comfy" she grinned, hugging herself in the jumper. "Can I keep it?"

"Yeah, of course" he smiled, overjoyed that she liked his small gift.

Rose ran ahead down the stairs, leaving Scorpius and Lily to walk side by side down the few remaining stairs.

"Lily, do you have a spare coat or something that I can shrink down for Rose?" Scorpius asked as they reached the bottom.

"Yeah, why?"

"She hasn't got any clothes here that are her size so I need to shrink a few things down temporarily"

"Oh, so that's why she's got your jumper...that was really sweet by the way. Come with me" Lily said, taking his hand and pulling him to the cupboard under the stairs. Lily reached inside and pulled out a dark green coat, a pair of wellies, a dark blue bobble hat and a pair of black gloves. "She'll need shoes, gloves, a hat and a scarf" she explained, reaching into the cupboard again to find a scarf.

"Oh no, it's fine she can have one of mine" Scorpius smirked, summoning his scarf from his bag. Lily laughed as he caught the green Slytherin scarf in his hand.

"She's got to wear that!" she laughed, "And I've got to have a camera ready when Uncle Ron sees her wearing it!" she grinned.

Scorpius laughed with her. "You don't think he'll mind?"

"Maybe a tad, but I'm sure Rosie will love it" she beamed. She smiled as Scorpius shrunk down her belongings and draped them over his arm. They then headed into the kitchen to find Rose sat at the table with a bacon sandwich clutched in her hand.

"Morning, dearies!" Mrs Weasley greeted, handing Scorpius and Lily their own bacon sandwiches. "Did you sleep well?"

"Rose woke us up, so we had to get Scorp down to stay with her, but other than that, yeah we slept really well" Lily smiled. Molly's eyebrows hit the ceiling when she heard Lily.

"You let Scorpius stay the night in the girls' room?"

"Rose fell asleep on him, plus it was 3 in the morning, nana, so we just let him stay. That's all nana. Scorp says that Rose has nightmares if she doesn't sleep with him, so I was gonna ask Aunt Hermione if Rose could stay in Scorpius' room for the rest of the time they're here?" Lily explained.

"Rosie, darling, when you have nightmares, what happens?" Molly asked Rose.

"Well, I wake up crying and my Scorp'us comes and hugs me better" she shrugged. "they were happening every night, So Scorp'us just let me sleep in his bed with him at Hogwarts and the nightmares went away" she smiled, beaming over at Scorpius.

"I'll talk to Hermione about it" Molly nodded to Lily. She couldn't help but smile inside when she heard Rose say "my Scorp'us" so naturally. She knew that her Rosie had fallen in love with the boy when she started talking about him so much after their 4th year, and she was certain now that Scorpius loved her granddaughter just as much.

"So, what are you going to do today?" Molly asked Rose, who was tucking into another bacon sandwich next to Scorpius.

"Lily's gonna show Scorp'us the lake. We're gonna go skating!" she grinned excited.

"Granddad said he checked it and it's safe to skate on, nana, so don't worry" Lily spoke up.

"Okay, I'll go and find out the boots" she smiled, leaving the kitchen in search of about 20 pairs of ice skates.

"I think we should wait for the others before we go skating" Lily said. "Why don't we go and play exploding snap until they wake up?"


	17. Chapter 17

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"Lily's gonna show Scorp'us the lake. We're gonna go skating!" she grinned excited.

"Granddad said he checked it and it's safe to skate on, nana, so don't worry" Lily spoke up.

"Okay, I'll go and find out the boots" she smiled, leaving the kitchen in search of about 20 pairs of ice skates.

"I think we should wait for the others before we go skating" Lily said. "Why don't we go and play exploding snap until they wake up?"

* * *

One by one, the rest of the Weasleys and Potters drifted down for breakfast. Scorpius gave Rose her newest clothes and let her wrap up warm before summoning his own coat and scarf. Rose giggled when he gave her the scarf, as she noticed the Slytherin crest.

"I'm not a Slytherin!" she giggled.

"But I am" he smirked. "if you don't want my scarf I can always put it away" he said reaching forwards to grab the scarf.

"No!" she squealed, clutching the scarf. "I wanna wear it. It smells like you" she beamed, hugging Scorpius' knees before holding his hand. Scorpius smirked at this – Rose didn't want to give any of his stuff back simply because it was his.

Together, Scorpius, Rose, Hugo, Al, Lily, James, Fred, Roxy, Lucy, Molly, Louis, Dom, Victoire and Teddy all walked down to the frozen lake, clutching pairs of raggedy skating boots in their arms. Scorpius had again shrunk a pair to fit Rose's tiny feet. As they reached the lake, Scorpius was amazed. The large oval lake had frozen completely. It was surrounded by lots of evergreen plants, all covered in a blanket of snow. Scorpius put on his own borrowed skating boots before turning to Rose to do up her laces, and then they were off.

Everyone had a laugh for the first 10 minutes as everyone fell over several times. Rose continued to be a shaky skater, so held tightly to Scorpius' hand. Scorpius loved this. He felt so at home with the Weasleys and Potters at the Burrow. He loved his own family and wouldn't replace them for anyone, but he couldn't help but want to be a part of the Weasleys.

After falling several times, Rose began to really enjoy herself. She was eventually brave enough to let go of Scorpius' hand and skate beside him without support. She hastily grabbed onto his legs when James and Fred zoomed past, causing her to lose her balance, but other than that, she did really well.

* * *

Several hours later, the parents came out to watch, bringing lunch with them. Harry cleared a patch of ground of snow with his wand and everyone sat down to eat. Scorpius gratefully sipped the homemade vegetable soup that Mrs Weasley had brought out, warming up slightly as the hot liquid slid down his throat. Rose was also eating the soup, but was instead dunking bits of bread in it and gobbling them up quickly, trying not to burn her fingers.

After lunch, everyone walked back towards the Burrow together. As they neared the ginormous house, the rest of the kids broke out into a snowball fight. Rose immediately begged Scorpius to let her join in (he didn't know why she felt the need to ask him), so he let her go but said that he was going to help with clearing away lunch. Rose nodded and ran away, scooping up snow in her hands and charging screaming at Hugo, who scooped her off the ground, flipped her upside down causing Rose to giggle.

Scorpius was carrying the picnic basket full of leftover food, so followed Mrs Weasley, Ginny, Hermione, Angelina, Fleur and Audrey into the kitchen. As they started to put everything away, the women asked Scorpius about himself. They asked him how his studies were going, what he wanted to do for a career, how he was enjoying staying at the Burrow and many other questions. Soon, the clearing up was done, so everyone except Hermione left to go and laugh at their kids beating their silly husbands in the snow fight.

"Thank you for looking after Rose, Scorpius" Hermione said, sitting at the table and gesturing for Scorpius to join her. "I hope it hasn't affected your school work or anything"

"No, Mrs Weasley, it's been amazing looking after Rose" he smiled. "She's just such a bundle of energy. It makes like at school a lot more interesting."

"Call me Hermione. Calling me Mrs Weasley makes me sound old" she chuckled. "My mother-in-law actually said something about you and Rose this morning Scorpius. Is it true that Rose's nightmares stop when she's with you?"

"Yeah, she was having them every night so I would go and comfort her and she'd sleep soundly the whole night if I stayed with her. I hope you don't mind that I actually just let her share my bed now?" he blushed.

"No, not at all. If the nightmares stop then that's definitely a good sign" Hermione nodded. "I'm going to tell you something, Scorpius, but I'd like you to keep this to yourself. Rose has been having the same recurring nightmare since she was 4, but we never found a way to stop it. We tried dreamless sleep potion and everything, but nothing worked. It seems that you have finally become the answer to her problem" she smiled.

"Do you know what the nightmare is about?" he asked.

"When Rose started a wizarding primary school at 4, a stray spell went straight into her. It left her with a scar on her arm, but since then she's been having the same nightmare about a wizard in a hooded cloak sending the spell at her. Although it doesn't seem scary, Rose has been terrified of hooded figures since she was a child, so the nightmare never went away" Hermione explained.

Scorpius remembered Rose telling him about this event at the beginning of the year, so nodded as Hermione finished. "Who shot the spell at her?" he asked.

"That's the thing, no one knows. Rose claimed to have seen this hooded figure appear out of nowhere then after she had been hit by the spell he was gone. Ron didn't believe her, and neither did anyone else, they all think it was an accidental child burst of magic, but Rose was so scared, so I think that the hooded figure did appear and meant to attack my daughter" she shuddered. "I had the wards increased so he never came back, but I always worry he'll try to hurt her again" she said sadly.

"I don't know why my presence soothes Rose, but do you think it has anything to do with wanting protection?" Scorpius wondered aloud.

"What do you mean?" Hermione asked.

"I mean, lots of insecure girls want a strong guy to come and hold her safe in his arms, right? So what if instead of being insecure, Rose actually craves physical protection so she knows there is no way that this attacker can get her?"

"That actually makes sense, Scorpius. What did you get in your OWLs?"

"12 Os, identical to Rose. I'm taking the same NEWTs as her too" Scorpius said.

"You are a very clever boy, Scorpius. I think you would do well as a healer or a psychiatrist, as you seem to figure out people very easily" she smiled. "I think that your theory may be right, but what happens when Rose returns to her normal age in 2 months? At 5 Rose obviously loves you to bits, so is happy to share your bed, but what will happen when she returns to normal? She'll start having nightmares again" Hermione said gloomily.

"I'll figure something out, Hermione" Scorpius promised, "but I really should go and find Rose. She's been dying to go out in the snow since we got here, so she won't be overly pleased if I'm not out there letting her pummel me with snow" he smirked before standing and leaving Hermione alone in the kitchen.

_I can see why Rosie's head over heels for him now_ she smiled to herself. _He really is a truly outstanding boy._


	18. Chapter 18

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"I'll figure something out, Hermione" Scorpius promised, "but I really should go and find Rose. She's been dying to go out in the snow since we got here, so she won't be overly pleased if I'm not out there letting her pummel me with snow" he smirked before standing and leaving Hermione alone in the kitchen.

_I can see why Rosie's head over heels for him now_ she smiled to herself. _He really is a truly outstanding boy._

* * *

Scorpius walked back outside with his head down and his hands pushed inside his jacket pockets. _It's no wonder that Rose has nightmares_ he thought, _any child would be terrified if someone tried to curse them at a young age_. He immediately began forming a plan to find the evil person that had cursed Rose, but his train of thoughts were cut short when for the third time that day he was pushed to the floor.

As he landed face first into the thick snow, he heard a muffled giggle, giving away the identity of the person sitting on his back. "Rosie, gerrof me" came his muffled plea from under a few inches of snow. Rose giggled again, not moving. She squealed when Scorpius rolled over so that he was lying on his back. Rose had wriggled so that she was again sat on top of his chest.

"Got you!" she squealed, leaning down and hugging him. "You took a long time, Scorp'us" she said, curiously lifting one of her tiny eyebrows.

Scorpius sat up and answered quickly, wiping the snow off of his face, "I was just helping your nana and your mum clear up. But now I'm here to join in the snow fight!" he said, scooping up a ball of snow and gently throwing it at Rose, who leapt back, falling on her back onto Scorpius' legs. She scampered to her feet and scooped up a snowball of her own, throwing it at Scorpius. It hit his chest, but he didn't even flinch.

"Is that all you got, Rosie?" he smirked, bouncing a snowball in his palm. Rose giggled, looking behind Scorpius. Dreading what he would see, Scorpius slowly turned around, only to be pelted by about 30 snowballs, which covered him from head to toe in snow. He paused, shocked, and gasped, looking up and down his body to see himself covered in snow.

"Is that all you got, Malfoy?" Ron yelled, swinging his arm back to throw another snow ball. As he did so, the rest of the Weasleys and Potters who had also thrown snowballs at him quickly ran into a circle, trapping Scorpius and Rose in the middle. Rose quickly ran to stand beside Al and Hugo, grabbing a snowball for herself and preparing to throw it. Scorpius fell to the floor, huddling his arms around his head as another round of snow was pelted at him from all directions.

"STOP! I SURRENDER!" he cried after about the third round of snowballs hit him. He shakily stood, weighed down form the amount of snow stuck to him. Rose ran over to him and stared up at him.

"You look like a snowman" she giggled, hugging Scorpius' knees. "Let's make a snow man, Scorp'us!" she cried immediately after, the idea lighting up her face. So Scorpius and Rose began to make a snowman. They were immediately joined by the rest of Weasleys and soon, Operation Snowman was underway.

When they finished, everyone stood back to admire their work. Yet it didn't seem complete. Rose then found a stick and propped it into the snowman's snow arm, like a wand. This finished off the snowman, so Scorpius quickly coughed, covering his mouth. As he did so, he grabbed his wand inside his pocket, whispered a quick spell, and watched at Rose jumped back surprised as the snow wizard started to spin in circles, singing Jingle Bells really loudly and out of tune.

"Never get it right" Scorpius frowned, glaring at the snowman that was making itself dizzy.

"That was a nifty bit of magic" Harry said, walking up behind Scorpius and putting his hand on his shoulder. "Where'd you learn that?"

"My dad taught me when I was younger. But I can never get it right. It's supposed to dance on the spot and actually sing in tune, but it never works" Scorpius grinned as the snow wizard toppled to the floor from dizziness, exploding snow everywhere. Everyone laughed at the snow wizard's antics, but the laughter soon died down so it was just Rose's tinkling laugh echoing around the field.

"He he he the snowman fell over" she laughed, pointing at the pile of snow that was the snowman. Her laughing was cut short when she suddenly did a massive sneeze, tripping over her feet in the process.

As Scorpius picked Rose up out of the snow he said "Come on, missus, we better get you inside before you get the flu." Rose moaned, but nevertheless allowed Scorpius to carry her indoors and out of the cold air.

"I know you don't like Draco still" Harry muttered to Ron as they watched the blonde boy carry the little red head through the snow to the warm house, "But you have to admit that his son isn't that bad"

"I know. I couldn't believe it when you invited him for Christmas, but to be honest he's done a great job with Rosie. It's gonna be a shame when she turns back to her normal age" Ron nodded in agreement.

"Well, think what it's going to be like for him. Him and Rosie are now practically inseparable, and yet in less than two months they are gonna go back to just sharing a common room" Harry frowned before rounding up the kids. "All you lot get inside too before Molly yells at us all for getting too cold!" he yelled, walking back towards the house, where there was a woman stood in the doorway, arms crossed across her chest.

"Too late, mate" Ron muttered with a grin as they neared the house.

* * *

Scorpius sat down with Rose in an armchair by the fire. Scorpius quickly dried their clothes with a few spells and they removed their coats, hats, gloves and scarves. "You feeling a bit warmer yet?" he asked Rose, who was huddled up in Scorpius' shrunken jumper.

"Not yet, Scorp'us" she said, he teeth slightly chattering.

Scorpius wrapped his arms around the gradually tiring girl and whispered in her ear "that any better?" Rose nodded, closing her eyes sleepily. She relaxed into his arms and was softly snoring when the rest of the Weasley family trooped back in from outside. Hermione took one look at Rose's tiny sleeping form and said "Scorpius, why don't you take Rose upstairs? Put her up in your room, as she's gonna be sleeping up there with you for the rest of your stay" she said. Ron's face twisted in confusion as Scorpius gently lifted Rose and carried her carefully up the rickety stairs.

"He's the cure to her nightmares, Ron" Hermione said before her husband even had the chance to say a word. "He's extremely bright, Ronald, he is just as bright as Rosie. He thinks that he's figured out the answer to her night terrors" she said, happiness evident on her face.

"What does he think?" Ron asked slightly excitedly.

"He thinks that Rose craves physical protection, but I think it's a bit more than that" Hermione smiled.

"What do you mean more than that?"

"Scorpius' explanation to his theory was that Rose craves physical protection so she knows he can't get her again just as insecure girls want their Prince Charming to come hold her safe in her arms. I think he was closer with his comparison" Hermione said. Upon seeing her husband's confused face, she said slightly exasperatedly "Ron, I think Rosie is craving some Prince Charming of her own who will sweep her off of her feet and fight off the bad guys for her" she almost whispered, "and I think that Scorpius Malfoy may be her Prince Charming."

* * *

**A/N: Sorry that i haven't updated in a few days - i had to return to school today (urgh) so have had to do loads of homework before i could write this chapter. Same plea as always - Keep reviewing - almost at 50 now! -Rxx**


	19. Chapter 19

**A/N: OMG When I came home from school today to find that the reviews had soared I was sooo so happy! Please review again after this chapter! (You should have seen my face, just imagine telling a small kid that they are allowed as much chocolate as they can carry from the supermarket – that was my face!) Keep reviewing! Let's break 75 now! - a very very happy R xx**

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"Ron, I think Rosie is craving some Prince Charming of her own who will sweep her off of her feet and fight off the bad guys for her" she almost whispered, "and I think that Scorpius Malfoy may be her Prince Charming."

* * *

Scorpius lay Rose down on his bed gently, before standing and looking down on her. He softly tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear before leaving the room, only half closing the door behind him. With one last look at Rose's sleeping form, he headed back downstairs to find Al. The two had become quite close friends after Al had returned to school, despite the accident. At first, they had gotten along just to please Rose, but now the pair were quite close as friends.

As Scorpius came down the last flight of stairs, he felt as if everyone was watching him carefully, as if they were judging his every move. "If you hear Rose getting up, can you tell me please?" he asked quietly, twiddling his thumbs nervously, eyes glue to the floor between his shoes, "It's just she'll probably wake up crying and screaming" he said before walking over to Al who was sat on the sofa playing chess against Hugo.

"Knight to E4" Hugo said, a smug smirk forming on his face. Scorpius watched amused as Al's face crumpled as Hugo's knight smashed his bishop to pieces, leaving him in checkmate. Al turned to look at Scorpius, who quickly dropped his smile. Hugo, always the gracious winner, leapt up from his seat, scattering the pieces everywhere, and exclaimed loudly "that's 9 games to 2, Ally boy!" he said, whooping and jumping around like a monkey.

Al glared at Hugo before turning to Scorpius. "What's up? You look slightly worried" he frowned.

"It's probably nothing, just felt as if everyone was judging me when I came downstairs….It's probably just me, don't worry" Scorpius said, looking anywhere but his friend's face. If he had looked, he would have seen Al's eyes flash with concern that Scorpius had heard what Hermione had said.

"Scorp, what are you doing for the rest of the Christmas holdiays? I know you're going home with Rose after lunch on Christmas Day, but if you've got a day free do you want to go into Diagon Alley with me and Hugo? Rosie can come too, obviously" Al said.

"Yeah, that'd be cool. We probably won't do loads while we're at the Manor. We'll go and see my gran on boxing day, but other than that I'm free until New Years Eve" Scorpius smiled. He suddenly thought of something. "Al, we have this New Years Eve Ball thing every year at the manor in the garden. Obviously Rose will be coming along this year, so would you and the rest of your family like to come?"

"That's cool. I'm taking that it's a dress-up-formally occasion" Al said, "So we will have to go to Diagon Alley before that then"

"Why?"

"Well, I need new dress robes, but also, Rosie will need something pretty to wear, won't she?"

"Oh yeah. I guess we will have to meet up then, Potter" Scorpius smiled, nudging Al in the side.

"Yeah, I guess, Malfoy" Al smirked.

* * *

The next two days passed by quite quickly. They spent most mornings ice skating on the pond or having snowball fights. In the afternoons, all of the children would either play games or bake food in the large Weasley kitchen. Rose seemed to thoroughly enjoy cooking, and so they ended up making enough brownies, cookies and cupcakes to feed an army. All too soon, it was Christmas Eve, and everyone was getting tired of waiting, especially Rose.

"Can't I open my present now?" She begged for what felt like the fiftieth time.

"Not yet. You just have to wait until tomorrow morning" Scorpius said in a slightly bored tone, not even looking up from his chess game against Hugo. The children had held a massive chess tournament the day before and today was the final round; Hugo vs. Scorpius, Weasley vs. Malfoy. Although Hugo was good, he hadn't anticipated that Scorpius was actually better than him. Rose ran off to play with Lily, who was playing exploding snap in the other corner with the girls.

Scorpius smirked as he moved his bishop into place, putting Hugo into checkmate. "Good game, but you can't beat me" he grinned, offering his hand to Hugo, before pulling it back and wiggling his fingers in front of his nose, sticking his tongue out.

Al, who was watching, laughed and said "I think you're the only person apart from Ron and Rose to beat him at chess, ever" he said, giving Scorpius a hi-five.

"Was she really that good?" he asked surprised.

"Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if she could beat Uncle Ron fair and square. He always cheats when he plays Rosie, and everyone knows it" Al smirked. "You'll have to play her when she's back to normal." Scorpius nodded and was just about to set up another game of chess with Al when Hermione came over.

"Are you packed for tomorrow afternoon?" she asked.

"Yeah, we're all ready to leave. The only things we'll need to add will be Rose's Christmas presents" Scorpius nodded. Hermione sniffed slightly. "What's wrong?"

"Oh, it's just that this will be the last time I see Rosie again before she's aged again" Hermione said, wiping her eyes.

"Well, Scorpius has invited us all to his ball" Al said, "so you'll see them again before we go back to school."

Hermione lifted an eyebrow and asked "This wouldn't happen to be the Malfoy New Years Eve Ball, would it?"

"The very same."

"And who exactly do you mean by 'us all'?"

"I mean everyone" Scorpius smiled. "Everyone's been really nice to me while I've been here plus I think Rose will enjoy it more of she has some of her family there."

"I'll talk to the adults about it, they might be busy. We have a lot of office parties this time of year" Hermione explained. "Are you sure your dad won't mind?"

"He won't mind. He's been wanting to invited you for years but never knew how to" Scorpius said. "He always wanted to make it up to the Weasleys after the war but never got the opportunity. Plus grandfather laughed it off, saying dad was stupid for even considering it" he smiled.

"Well, anything to annoy that old git, I say!" Ron yelled from across the room.

Hermione shook her head then whispered "He's already had quite a bit of firewhiskey, sorry he's starting to insult you"

"It's alright, I never really liked him" Scorpius smirked. His smirk was slightly disrupted when Rose came over from playing exploding snap, yawning.

"I'm really tired, Scorp'us" she said, yawning in the middle of it, "Can I go to bed yet?"

"Hermione?" Scorpius asked.

"There's nothing much more going on. It is quite late to be honest. Take her up, but if you want to come back down for another hour, just leave the door propped open" Hermione smiled. Scorpius picked up the tired little girl and carried her upstairs.

"It's nearly Christmas, Rosie" he whispered.

"I know, Scorp'us" she giggled, "we get presents tomorrow!"

"Yeah, we do, but tomorrow won't come unless you go to sleep" he said, putting Rose into bed. She snuggled into his pillow and was soon snoring softly. "Night Night, Rosie" Scorpius smiled, leaning down and placing a small kiss on the little girl's forehead before heading back downstairs to laugh with Al at the adults, who were getting steadily more drunk as the evening progressed.


	20. Chapter 20

**A/N: Just to warn everyone, my coursework deadlines have suddenly appeared around the corner, so if I don't update as fast, I'm really sorry! Hope to be able to update week at least….Keep reviewing! The more reviews this gets, the faster I'll try to update, and that is a promise! - Rxx**

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"It's nearly Christmas, Rosie" he whispered.

"I know, Scorp'us" she giggled, "we get presents tomorrow!"

"Yeah, we do, but tomorrow won't come unless you go to sleep" he said, putting Rose into bed. She snuggled into his pillow and was soon snoring softly. "Night Night, Rosie" Scorpius smiled, leaning down and placing a small kiss on the little girl's forehead before heading back downstairs to laugh with Al at the adults, who were getting steadily more drunk as the evening progressed.

* * *

The boys drifted to bed at about 1am. Because they were already at least 17, Scorpius, Al, James and Fred had all been able to legally have some of the firewhiskey, so were a teensy bit drunk. As they noisily entered their room, Rose woke up.

"Are you drunk?!" she asked Scorpius, her eyes shooting to the ceiling.

"We're not drunk!" Al slurred, bending down to Rose's height and smiling loopily.

"Yeah, Rosie, baby, we're just merry!" James giggled uncharacteristically.

"I'm not _*hick*_ completely drunk _*hick*_" Scorpius said, hiccupping. "I've had _*hick*_ a little bit _*hick*_ of firewhiskey, but not _*hick*_ loads" he frowned at himself, covering his mouth as he hiccupped again and again.

Rose giggled "You've got the hiccups!" she squealed, taking Scorpius' hand and leading him over to their sleeping bag. Scorpius sat down heavily and pulled Rose into his lap, laughing.

"Always happ-_*hick*-_ens when I ha-_*hick*-_ve a drin-_*hick*-_k" he chuckled, slipping into the sleeping bag and huddling into Rose. "We better get _*hick*_ a bit of sleep _*hick*_, Rosie, otherwise you'll be _*hick*_ too tired for tomorrow _*hick*"_ he yawned, lying down. When he hiccupped again, he got back up and said "I'm going to find _*hick*_ a hiccup potion _*hick*_ to stop these bloody _*hick*_ hiccups" he scowled, quietly leaving the room.

Rose sat and watched as her three drunken cousins wobbled around the room, tripping over everything and landing in a pile on the floor. They slowly made their way to bed and were snoring by the time Scorpius returned, holding five small bottles in his hand. Hugo raised his eyebrow. "Why four bottles?"

Scorpius quickly opened a small purple bottle and downed the violet liquid inside, scrunching his face at the taste. "One hiccupping potion for me to shut up my hiccups, and the other four are hangover potions for when I wake up and they're rudely awaken early in the morning" he smirked, glancing down at the three boys who had passed out onto their sleeping bags. Hugo nodded before closing his eyes again.

Scorpius climbed back into his sleeping bag with Rose, hugged her lightly before the pair fell asleep in each other's embrace, excited for what the morning would bring.

* * *

"Scorp'us! Wake up!" Rose cried, standing in front of the sleeping blonde boy. "It's Christmas, Scorp'us! Wake up!" she tried again, but to no avail. Scorpius groaned slightly in his sleep, turning over onto his side.

"MALFOY! MOVE YOUR LAZY ARSE!" Hugo screamed into his ear with a grin. Scorpius immediately leapt out of bed, dazed, rubbing his ear.

"What time is it?" he groaned as Rose laughed.

"About 5am. All the parents and intoxicated children are being woken up right now by all of us younger children" Hugo smirked. "Wake Al up, will you? Then the three of us can handle Fred and James – they're always a nightmare to get up" Hugo said, chuckling.

Scorpius shook Al awake, who seemed completely used to the early wakeup call and asked "who gets up at 5am on Christmas morning?!"

"We always do. It takes hours to open all the presents, and plus its habit from when we were younger. We've never had a Christmas where we have been woken later than about 6 o clock. That was a rare occasion when Uncle Ron spiked all the kids drinks with Uncle George's heavy sleeper potion." Al explained as they stood in front of Hugo, rubbing the sleep out of their eyes.

"We don't really get up at home until about 10ish" Scorpius said. He quickly fished out the hangover potions and tossed one at Al. "Should help with that hangover" he smirked.

"How much did I drink?"

"More than me, less than those two" Scorpius said, jabbing a finger in the direction of the snoring boys. "How do you wake them up exactly? They're still out cold."

"Watch" Louis grinned as Hugo carefully lay down a small blue disc on the floor. They all stood back and Al pointed his wand at the disc, whispering "Aguamenti".

The blue disc started to expand, sliding underneath the boys' sleeping bags and across the floor. As soon as the blue disc surrounded them, it was if a bubble popped; James and Fred, plus their sleeping bags, dropped into a swimming pool a metre deep. They stood up spluttering and quickly rescued their soggy belongings from sinking.

"You should know by now to set an alarm" Hugo grinned. James shot a silent spell at Hugo, who gasped, clutching his face.

"You smirk at me like that, and I make your face stick like that" James growled, drying himself off. Hugo's eyes looked like they were about to bulge out of their sockets as he discovered that James had indeed frozen his smirk onto his face.

"Undo the spell, James, and I'll chuck you one of these" Scorpius said, holding a hangover potion in his hand.

"Fine, but only because my head is killing" James muttered, flicking his wand at Hugo again before catching the potion. He and Fred gulped down their potions and soon enough, all of the boys and Rose headed downstairs.

* * *

The Weasley Christmas had always been a very loud, busy occasion. All of the Weasleys would either wake up or be woken at 5am, and presents would immediately be bee-lined for by the kids.

Scorpius sat in a large circle with the rest of the Weasley children, with Rose bouncing excitedly up and down in his lap. The adults waved their wands, stifling yawns, towards the large Christmas tree in the corner, and piles of gifts floated towards every child in the room.

Scorpius watched as Rose gleefully opened all of her presents, squealing at most of them before eagerly showing Scorpius and putting them aside to open the next gift. The pile in front of Rose slowly diminished, leaving behind a mound of presents (including gifts for her as a child and as a teen) and another pile of wrapping paper. Scorpius beamed as he helped Rose pull on her Weasley Christmas jumper, a dark grey with a forest green R knitted on the front.

"Oh, I almost forgot!" Hermione suddenly said, seeing that Rose had finished opening her gifts and was now trying to prize open a small muggle toy called a puzzle box that Scorpius had given her. She flicked her wand towards the tree again and another pile of gifts sailed towards Scorpius and Rose. The little girl dived forwards, but halted when Hermione called "They're not for you, Rosie. Those ones are Scorpius'"

Scorpius looked at the abundant pile of gifts in awe. He had never expected to get anything from the Weasleys. He opened the gifts slowly, marvelling at each one. He had his own Weasley jumper from Molly (Dark green with a grey S on the front), a collection of WWW products from George ("You can have a family discount too, seeming as you've been given the trademark Weasley jumper" George grinned. Molly smacked him round the back of the head. "I mean, you're welcome to a discount for looking after our darling Rosie so well"), a few rare books on transfiguration and a new wizard's chess set from Ron and Hermione and a massive collection of sweets from all of the children.

"We all pitched in to get you some stocks" Al laughed.

"Just don't let Rosie at them, or they'll be gone in minutes" Hugo laughed as Rose scooped a chocolate frog from her own pile of sweets and happily started munching on it.

* * *

After a good morning of opening gifts, playing with new belongings and a large round of thank yous, the entire Weasley family sat down to a fantastic Christmas dinner, cooked by all of the women. Scorpius friendly chattered with everyone at the table, helping Rose to cut up her food as she sat in his lap.

After their Christmas lunch, Scorpius and Rose packed up their belongings before saying a final goodbye to the Weasleys before New Year.

"We'll see everyone in a few days for a big party, hun" Scorpius soothed as Rose sat in his arms, tears slowly dribbling down her face. "You'll only be away for a few days and then they'll all see you again"

"Big party?" she asked, clashing her eyes with his.

"Yeah. There's gonna be lots of people, music, dancing, lots of food and fireworks" Scorpius grinned, grabbing their suitcase form the floor. "We better be going, otherwise we're going to be late" he said, checking his watch quickly.

"Have fun with Scorpius, Rosie" Al grinned.

"We'll meet up in a few days to go shopping" Lily smiled, waving from the doorway.

"Rose, hun, I need you to close your eyes and hold you breathe" Scorpius whispered.

"Okay, Scorp'us" she said, squeezing her eyes shut and taking a deep breath. With a final wave goodbye, Scorpius turned on the spot and apparated his and Rose to Malfoy Manor.


	21. Chapter 21

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"Rose, hun, I need you to close your eyes and hold your breath" Scorpius whispered.

"Okay, Scorp'us" she said, squeezing her eyes shut and taking a deep breath. With a final wave goodbye, Scorpius turned on the spot and apparated him and Rose to Malfoy Manor.

* * *

Rose kept her eyes shut, just as Scorpius had said. When they arrived, Rose still had her eyes squeezed shut.

"You can open your eyes now, hun" he whispered in her ear. Rose gasped.

"You live here!?" Rose was amazed as Scorpius nodded, smiling. "It's so cool!" It really was in Rose's opinion. Scorpius' house was massive, and the stone was a pale blue. The driveway was really big too, and the garden around the house was huge! Actually, in general, Scorpius' house was huge.

"You really think my house is cool?" Scorp'us smirked as he put Rose down on the gravel path leading to his front door. "I always thought it was too big."

"Lots of rooms for hide and seek" she smiled, grabbing Scorpius' hand and dragging him along the path. As they got close to the door, it was opened by a house elf. Rose was a bit surprised, and she looked up at Scorpius and asked "What is it, Scorp'us?"

"Rosie, hun, this is my House elf, Dipsey" he said, smiling down at Dipsey, who was just as tall as Rose, so only came up to about Scorp'us' stomach.

"Master Scorpius, sir" Dipsey squeaked, bowing so that her ears touched Rose's shoes. Rose giggled. "Who is this, Master Scorpius?" she asked. "Dipsey has not seen this little girl here before, sir" she said, standing up and studying Rose.

"This is Rose, Dipsey. I'm looking after her for a bit" Scorp'us said, still holding Rose's hand. "Rose, say hello to Dipsey"

"Hello Dipsey" Rose said, offering out her hand, like her daddy had taught her to do when she met new people. "I've never seen a house elf before"

"Hello Miss Rose" Dipsey squeaked. Rose giggled again.

"I've never been called 'Miss' before! It sounds funny" she laughed.

Scorpius then said "We'll go and say hi to mum and dad, Dipsey. Where are they?"

"Mistress Astoria is in the kitchen with Master Draco, sir" Dipsey said, bowing again before leading them inside.

* * *

Scorpius' house was lots of different colours, making it very bright. The halls were all painted a pale yellow, and the doors were made out of a dark reddish wood. Scorpius led Rose through loads of corridors, and Rose soon felt very lost, but they soon ended up in his kitchen. Rose smiled as she spotted Draco by the sink, a pretty lady with wavy brown hair stood beside him.

"Merry Christmas, Rosie, Scorp" Draco beamed, opening his arms as Rose ran forwards to hug him.

"Merry Christmas, Scorp, darling" Astoria Malfoy beamed, walking forwards to hug her son.

"Merry Christmas to you too, Mum" Scorpius said, hugging his mum tight, before picking Rose up off the floor and balancing her on his back. "Rosie, this is my mum. Mum, this is Rose Weasley" he said, introducing the pair.

"You're really pretty" Rose blushed as Astoria shook her tiny hand, before burying her head in Scorpius' hair.

"Why, thank you, Rose" Astoria smiled, watching her son interact with Rose. "You can call me Tori if you can't say Astoria right" she offered.

"Tori is a bit easier" Rose quietly admitted as Scorpius swung her round, balancing her on his hip.

"Well, we're done in here, aren't we, dear?" Astoria asked Draco, who nodded. "Shall we go through to the lounge and open presents?" she smiled.

Together, the four people walked from the kitchen down a few more corridors towards the lounge. They passed a burnt, black door.

"What's in there?" Rose asked, curiously.

"That's the drawing room, hun. We never go in there" Scorpius explained.

"Why?"

"Because we just don't" Scorpius tried to explain without getting frustrated. "Lets just go open presents, yeah?"

"Okay, Scorp'us" Rose smiled, before realsing what he had said "there are presents for me?"

"Well there's one more from me" Scorpius smiled, remembering his shopping trip with Leo, Lysander and Lorcan.

As they walked into the lounge, both Rose and Scorpius gasped.

"What do you think? Do you like it?" Astoria asked, beaming.

"Mum, I love it! It's amazing!" Scorpius gasped, smiling. The lounge had a few plush sofas, but in the corner by the window stood a massive Christmas tree, covered all over with lights and baubles. The high ceiling was littered with intricate hanging decorations and colourful paper chains, and there was a large, warm fire burning away at the fireplace.

"Wow" was all Rose said from Scorpius' arms.

They all sat down, Astoria and Draco on one sofa, Scorpius and Rose on the one opposite. Rose crawled into Scorpius' lap and happily perched there as Draco levitated the presents over from under the tree.

"There are some there for Rose as well" Draco said. "We thought we'd get her a few things"

"Thank you, Draco and Tori" Rose grinned as Scorpius handed her a small box. She opened it to reveal a silver charm bracelet, with multiple charms attached. "Ooooh it's really pretty!" she exclaimed. "Thank you!" she cried, passing the bracelet to Scorpius to put on her wrist.

Scorpius then picked up some of his presents, and was just about to tear into the first one when Astoria suddenly asked "I've never seen that jumper before, Scorp. Where did you get it?"

"_You_ got a Weasley Jumper?" Draco asked with a look of misbelief. Astoria glanced his was questioningly. "You only get a weasley jumper if Molly Weasley properly considers you a part of the family" he explained. "They must like you a lot, Scorp"

"Yeah, I guess" Scorpius nodded. "It's really comfy" he admitted, before remembering the present in his hand, and started opening it.

* * *

A few presents later, Scorpius and Rose had a pile of presents on the sofa next to them. Scorpius received numerous books whilst Rose mainly received sweets. Finally, there was only one present left, a small square box for Rose.

"This one's from me, hun" Scorpius smiled as he handed Rose the box. She gleefully opened it, and stared at it as she gently lifted the lid.

Inside a beautifully decorated wooden jewellery box lay a necklace on a bed of silk. The necklace was in the shape of a time turner, but in the middle a single crystal rose charm was sat.

"Do you like it?" Scorpius asked hesitantly, as Rose was sat silent in his lap.

"I love it Scorp'us!" she said, turning round with the wooden box in her hand. "Can you put it on for me?" Scorpius gently lifted the fine gold necklace out of the box and fastened it around the little girl's neck.

"It has an extendable chain, so you can still have it when you're older again" Scorpius said as Rose hugged him.

"Thank you, Scorp'us. It's really really pretty" Rose smiled, sitting up in Scorpius' lap. "Love you!" she said, leaning forward and kissing Scorpius' cheek.

"Love you too, hun" Scorpius smiled, kissing her forehead. Draco and Astoria sat and watched as they witnessed the encounter.

"Why don't you go and take all of your presents up to your room?" Astoria suggested. "You can show Rose around the house as well, Scorp"

"Okay, mum. Thank you for our presents" he said, standing and kissing his mum on the cheek.

"Thank you, Tori" Rose smiled, before Scorpius carried her and their presents out of the room.

"Draco, darling, it's going to crush Scorpius when Rose is returned to her normal age" Astoria said to her husband as the door closed.

"I know, Tori" Draco sighed. "I haven't seen him this happy before now. I do hope Rose remembers everything when she ages again."

* * *

**A/N: I'm sorry I haven't been able to update that often, but I'm entering the horrible, painful time in my life called GCSEs. I will try to update regularly, I promise! -Rxx**


	22. Chapter 22

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"Why don't you go and take all of your presents up to your room?" Astoria suggested. "You can show Rose around the house as well, Scorp"

"Okay, mum. Thank you for our presents" he said, standing and kissing his mum on the cheek.

"Thank you, Tori" Rose smiled, before Scorpius carried her and their presents out of the room.

"Draco, darling, it's going to crush Scorpius when Rose is returned to her normal age" Astoria said to her husband as the door closed.

"I know, Tori" Draco sighed. "I haven't seen him this happy before now. I do hope Rose remembers everything when she ages again."

* * *

Scorpius carried Rose up two flights of stairs and along a corridor to his room. Rose squealed as he opened the door.

"Your bed is soooooo huge!" she beamed, jumping out of Scorpius' arms and leaping onto his bed, bouncing on it.

"Rosie" he laughed, putting down their pile of gifts by the door before walking over to the bed.

"What, Scorp'us?" she laughed as she bounced up and down on his giant bed, covered in a dark blue duvet.

"Since when do you walk into someone else's room and immediately jump on their bed?" he joked, raising his eyebrow.

"You're bed looked bouncy" Rose quietly admitted, slowing her bounces and sitting on Scorpius' bed. "Sorry Scorp'us" she said slightly sadly.

"Get up, hun" he grinned, before stepping up onto the bed with her. She stared curiously up at him as he towered over her, standing on the mattress. "Bouncing's more fun with two people" he laughed, bouncing up and down, Rose joining in, taking his hand. Together, the pair bounced up and down on Scorpius' springy bed, laughing the whole time.

After lots of bouncing, the pair collapsed onto the bed in a heap. Rose sat panting on top of Scorpius, who was also a little short of breath. "I haven't had that much fun in forever" he said, pulling Rose down into a cuddle. Rose let out a gentle tired yawn as she cuddled into his chest.

"You've had a long day, missus" Scorpius said gently, soothingly running a hand through Rose's auburn hair. It had really grown over the last few months, and was now halfway down her back, as Scorpius hadn't dared to cut it. He loved gently running his fingers through her wavy red hair, and was quite upset that he wouldn't be able to do this for much longer. Scorpius carried on stroking her hair as Rose quietly fell asleep in his lap.

* * *

The next morning, Scorpius decided to show Rose around his house. Although it was probably going to bore her a little, Scorpius had nothing much else to do with her. The small girl was, strangely enough, fascinated by everything in Malfoy Manor. She was amazed by the system of secret passages and was always asking questions. What did Scorpius do when he was younger? How does he not get lost with all these winding corridors? Her stream of questions stopped abruptly as Scorpius opened the doors to the large dining room.

Rose stared around, her mouth gaping open. "This is where you eat?" she asked, amazed. The large room had floor to ceiling windows all along one side, which allowed light to flood into the spacious room. The long table was a deep red wood, the same wood as the doors in the house, and was surrounded by lots of elegant chairs with luxurious seats.

But Rose wasn't really interested in the elegant table, or the plush chairs, but in the windows, or more specifically, what she could see out of them. She slowly wandered over to the windows, entranced by the scenic view of the Malfoy Manor garden.

"It's…..it's beautiful" she whispered, awed. When you would expect snow in the garden, there was none. The greener-than-green grass was trimmed down neatly and extended for hundreds of metres. All this grass was outlined by lots of different fruit trees; apples, cherries, pears, plums and lots of other various fruit bushes, all of which were covered in ripened fruit. A neat set of flowerbeds sat blooming with vibrantly coloured flowers as well, all perfectly trimmed. "Why is there no snow?" Rose asked curiously.

"There's a ward over the garden and it has loads of spells on it to make sure it's always summer" Scorpius smiled. "Do you want to go outside" he suggested, taking Rose's tiny hand in his and leading her outside.

For a moment, Rose just stood on the spot and swept her gaze around the huge garden, taking everything in. But the moment soon passed, as she sprinted off towards the trees. Scorpius laughed as she ran towards the trees, but started to worry as she suddenly vanished from sight.

"Rosie?" he called. No answer. "Rosie?!" he called louder, worry very evident in his voice. He jogged towards the trees where he had last seen her. As he got closer, he heard a small gasp, then a giggle.

"Scorp'us!" he heard he giggle from above him.

"How on earth did you get up there?!" Scorpius exclaimed, staring up to the top of the tree in disbelief. Rose was happily perched on a branch high out of his reach above him.

"I don't know!" she giggled. "I saw a birdy up here, and then POP! I was up here with the birdies!" she said.

Scorpius stared up at the small girl in the tree, gaping. He knew that young witches and wizards had sudden outbursts of magic as small children, but he'd never heard of any 5 year old managing to apparate. "Can you get down?" he asked, and idea hitting him.

"Ummmm… I don't know?" she asked, her face twisting into a familiar Malfoy smirk, which Scorpius was amazed to see she had picked up from him.

"This might not do anything, Rosie, but can you try and imagine standing next to me down here?" he knew it was a long shot, but it was worth a try.

A sharp 'pop!' confirmed Scorpius' suspicions. He looked down, and there was Rose, stood right in front of him. "Come on, you. We need to go speak to my dad" Scorpius smirked, scooping Rose onto his shoulders and jogging back to the manor with her laughing gleefully on his shoulders.

"Dad?" Scorpius called once they were inside.

"Draaaaaacooooooooooo?" called Rose as well, joining in.

"Scorp? Rosie? What's up?" Draco suddenly materialised behind them. He had just emerged from a secret passageway behind them.

"We need to go to Hogwarts, Dad, as in, right now" Scorpius said, lifting Rose off of his shoulders and into the crook of his arm. "We have an issue."

* * *

**A/N: Ooooh I do LOVE adding twists to this! Don't quite know where this is going yet, but I'll leave you in suspense until I update again... Please review, and if i get enough reviews in the next few hours, you may find there is another chapter! -Rxx**


	23. Chapter 23

**A/N: Sorry I haven't updated in a while – coursework is to blame once again, so I'm really really sorry. But it'll all be over by next weekend, so hopefully I can update more! For anyone following my other story, I will be continuing it, you just might have to wait a little longer. Keep reviewing! The only reason I've even written this chapter was because the reviews soared for Chapters 21 and 22! Keep an eye out for updates! - Rxx**

* * *

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"We need to go to Hogwarts, Dad, as in, right now" Scorpius said, lifting Rose off of his shoulders and into the crook of his arm. "We have an issue."

* * *

Draco, Scorpius and Rose soon were enveloped in green flames that harmlessly licked their sides as they flooed through to Professor Longbottom's office.

"This is a….surprise" Longbottom said, rising from his chair as the three figures appeared in his office.

"We need to speak to McGonagll, Professor" Scorpius explained as Rose climbed up his body before perching herself on his back, scaling Scorpius' tall figure as if it was a climbing frame. Both Draco and Longbottom raised their eyebrows at the way Scorpius didn't even blink at this, automatically adjusting his arms to hold the small child in place, as if it was the most natural thing on earth to him.

"Is something wrong?" Longbottom asked after a second or two.

"Yeah, Rose can apparate" Scorpius said bluntly. The two men's jaws hit the ground.

"Scorp, you didn't mention that to me!" Draco spluttered. "That's incredible!"

"I'm worried though. She could apparate inside the Manor wards, when they're customly set to not allow apparation on the premises unless you've been pre-cleared. Rose wouldn't have been cleared as no one expected her to be able to apparate, but she got round our wards" Scorpius frowned.

"Is there something wrong with me?" Rose asked quietly from his back, twisting her little fingers gently in Scorpius' hair. You could tell it tickled him, but Scorpius fought to keep a straight face.

"Not exactly wrong, hun, it's just that you usually can't apparate until you're 17" he explained, his face morphing with laughter as Rose continued to fiddle with his hair.

"Oh" she said understandingly.

"I think this is a matter for McGonagall and the Ministry, Scorpius" Longbottom said, before leading Scorpius to her office.

* * *

"Minerva, Scorpius has made a rather…interesting…discovery" he said as they entered the headmistress' office.

"Rose can apparate, Professor" Scorpius explained.

"That _is_ interesting" McGonagall said, rising from her seat.

"That's not what's worrying me, Professor, it's the fact she can apparate within wards" Scorpius scowled slightly. He put Rose down and pointed to the window in the corner. "Rosie, can you imagine you're standing by that window for me?"

The adults gasped as Rose vanished with a small 'pop' and materialised by the window.

"You have a pretty view of the lake" Rose observed from her new position by the window, clueless to the surprise on the adults' faces.

"Now you see my issue, Professor" Scorpius said as Rose walked back to his side, grasping his hand.

"There's nothing we can do, I don't think" McGonagall frowned. "There is a spell that you can use to prevent people from being able to apparate, but it is irreversible, so Rose wouldn't be able to apparate when she reages-"

"-and she'd positively kill you if you took away her privilege of apparation" Draco finished with a grin.

"Please dad, stop picturing my gruesome death, it's a bit creepy" Scorpius laughed. "So what do we do then?"

"Rose, I need you to promise that you will never do that again unless Scorpius tells you to, okay?" McGonagall said, crouching down in front of Rose to her height.

"Okay" Rose smiled.

"Professor, please don't mention this to the Ministry" Scorpius suddenly frowned.

"I really should. They will want to investigate…"

"Exactly. They will take Rose away and examine her like she's an exhibit in a zoo" Scorpius frowned. "She's only got just over a month left like this, so if they take her away now, I may never see her again!" he finished with a shout, tears suddenly forming at him eyes. Scorpius turned on his heel and stalked out of the office. Rose stared questioningly at the door as it slammed shut, then burst into tears.

"It'll be alright, Rosie" Draco said, scooping the sobbing child into his arms, trying to comfort her. "Scorp's just a bit upset"

"I think you should go and find him, Neville" McGonagall said, motioning to the door. With a nod, Longbottom left.

* * *

He hadn't walked far when he heard strangled sobs coming from a hidden alcove. Scorpius was satb on the step in the alcove, sobbing into his hands.

"Scorpius, that was quite an outburst there. We need to know what's wrong" Longbottom said, sitting next to Scorpius on the floor.

"I just….I've got so little time left!" he said, wiping tears from his eyes hastily, trying but failing to stop his sobs.

"I know, Scorpius. It is going to be hard, but you must remember, there is every chance that Rose will remember all of this when she reages" Longbottom tried to comfort the boy at his side.

"But what if she doesn't?" Scorpius almost whispered, pain evident in his voice.

"Scorpius, even if she didn't, she will want to know exactly what has been happening to her for the last few months. She will be told exactly who cared for her all these months" Longbottom said, passing a tissue to Scorpius, who gratefully took it and dried his eyes.

"I'll look like an idiot from someone else's view"

"No, you won't. Rose will see that you cared for her as if she were your own child, Scorpius. You have sacrificed so much for her. You befriended her family, spent Christmas with them and if she needs any further proof, I heard you received a Weasley jumper. That will be the ultimate proof as to how much you love her" Longbottom said, instantly regretting the way he'd finished his sentence.

"Is it that obvious?" Scorpius smirked sadly.

"Unfortunately so" Longbottom smiled. "It's in your eyes, and in the way you care for her, and in the way you talk to her and listen and understand her" he explained. "Rose won't ever see you as an idiot after all this, Scorpius, just try to remember that."

* * *

Rose was sucking on a sugar quill in Draco's lap when Scorpius and Longbottom reentered the headmistress' office.

"You alright, Scorp?" Draco asked, worried for his son.

"Scorp'us! Are you feeling happy now? Draco said you were feeling upset and that made me upset 'cause I don't like it when you're upset and then you ran off and…" Rose cried, jumping out of Draco's lap and into Scorpius' arms.

"I'm better now, hun, I was just…..i just remembered something that upset me a lot" Scorpius said with a strained smile. "Anyway, now we sorted that issue with the apparation out, Professor, I think it's about time we went home. We're meeting up with the Weasleys and Potters tomorrow, so Rose'll need some sleep" Scorpius said.

"Of course, Scorpius. I expect to see you here for the start of term in a few day's time" McGonagall nodded. Scorpius walked Rose over to the fire and flooed away in burst of green. "Watch him, Draco" McGonagall warned, "He's going to be very disturbed by this. He's just realised how little time he has left for definite with Rose"

"I know, Minerva. I'll be going now, I guess" Draco nodded before following his son's footsteps and flooing out of the office.

* * *

Scorpius flooed his and Rose to his room in the manor. He walked Rose over to the bed and pulled out her puzzle box. "See if you can figure this out while I call someone quickly" he tossed the box at her and knelt down by the fire.

"The Burrow" Scorpius said, throwing a handful of floo powder into the grate and pushing his head through the flames.


	24. Chapter 24

**In the Previous Chapter…**

Scorpius flooed him and Rose to his room in the manor. He walked Rose over to the bed and pulled out her puzzle box. "See if you can figure this out while I call someone quickly" he tossed the box at her and knelt down by the fire.

"The Burrow" Scorpius said, throwing a handful of floo powder into the grate and pushing his head through the flames.

* * *

"Scorpius, dear, what a wonderful surprise!" Molly smiled, appearing at the grate in the kitchen at the Burrow, "Can I help you?"

"Hi, Mrs Weasey, could I speak to Al and Hugo please?" Scorpius said, glancing behind him as he heard Rose hum in annoyance at the puzzle box.

"Of course, I'll just grab them." Molly disappeared from Scorpius' view, and a few seconds later, her face was replaced by the two boys.

"Scorp, what's up?" Al greeted. "We only saw you yesterday"

"In know, but I was wondering if it is possible that you could take Rose off of my hands for an hour or two? It's just something happened today and-"

"-You want to throw things at your wall without Rose being in the way of potential missiles?" Hugo guessed with a grin.

"Yeah, that's about right" Scorpius shrugged through the flames. "So could you look after her for a bit? I'll come get her once I've finished…throwing things at walls, as you put it"

"Yeah, of course, send her through."

"Actually, Rose isn't going to come through the floo. You know your sofa in the living room? Go stand by that. She'll be over in a sec" Scorpius grinned.

"Scorp, what's going on?" Al frowned, suddenly alert.

"Look, the 'something' that happened today will be revealed when Rose arrives. I'll let her tell you herself" Scorpius said before drawing his head out of the fire, ending the fire call. "Rosie, Al and Hugo would like to see you for a bit, okay? Can you imagine you are sat on the sofa in the Burrow for me? I'll join you over there in a bit" Scorpius said.

"Okay, but don't be too long!" Rose grinned, before closing her eyes and vanishing with a pop.

Scorpius ducked his head back into the fire and reappeared in the kitchen of the Burrow again. He could hear pandemonium on the other side. "AL!" he yelled through the fireplace.

"Scorp! What the HELL just happened? Rose just-"

"Apparated onto the sofa, I know. We found out she can apparate really well, just by thinking about where she wants to be. Make sure she doesn't go anywhere, I'll be over once I've cleared my head a bit" Scorpius rushed to say, before again ending the fire call. To prevent anyone from coming in, Scorpius quickly placed wards on the door and fireplace, and flopped onto his bed, burying his face in his pillow.

With a groan, Scorpius sat up a while later, after thinking everything over. He went to his bedside table and picked up his quill. _Leo, I need your help…_

* * *

Rose laughed to herself as she sat on the sofa staring back at her family, who were all gaping at her.

"Rosie, you can apparate?" Hermione asked exasperately.

"Yeah! Scorp'us was quite su'prised too" she giggled at her family's facial expressions.

"How do you do it, Rosie?" asked Hugo.

"I don't know. I think of where I want to be and then POP! I'm there!"

"Can you show us?"

"No."

"Why not?" blurted Ron, Hermione and Hugo

"Scorp'us and Pro-fessar Magonagall said not to do it unless Scorp'us told me to."

"Please, Rosie?" begged Lily.

"No. Scorp'us told me not to, so I won't" Rose crossed her arms stubbornly, before remembering she had her puzzle box in her hand. She unfurled her arms and started happily twisting it, her face scrunched up in concentration.

"Al, try and get hold of Scorp" Hugo said.

"Already tried, he's blocked the floo" Al said, his lips pressing together in a tight line.

"So we're stuck with Rose until he comes to get her?"

"Pretty much. But to be honest, we won't even have to entertain her; Scorp's puzzle box will keep her busy enough for an hour" Al grinned.

* * *

Scorpius paced by the window until Leo's owl came crashing into it. Leo's owl was a bit blind, so couldn't see anything up close, hence why he crashed into everything.

"Stupid owl…" he muttered, plucking the message from the dazed owl's beak.

_Scorp,_

_Merry Christmas for yesterday! Hope the Christmas with the Weasels wasn't too bad. You'll have to spill the beans at the ball._

_I was worried about what you'd do when you realised how little time you have left caring for the little monkey. You tend to be a bit…disruptive when you get cross. I wouldn't be overly surprised if you'd smashed up half the manor by now. I hope you got Rose out of the way first though…_

_Anyway, the issue about her being able to apparate…I shouldn't worry about it. She trusts you with her life, Scorp, she'll listen to you. If she was going to apparate anywhere, it wouldn't be far from you, she adores you! So don't worry about her apparating away from you…_

_I like your idea of a final present for her as well…I know you think it's stupid and soppy, but I think she'll love it. We just need to get everything for it now. Speaking of presents, has the little genius figured out the box yet?_

_-Leo_

* * *

_Merry Christmas to you too, Mate._

_Urgh, the ball, you've just reminded me, I have to go get Rose a dress for that._

_You really don't think she'll just disappear randomly? I can't begin to imagine what would happen if she suddenly apparated somewhere in the middle of a lesson – she can apparate within wards, which would be problematic at Hogwarts, as no-one would be able to go after her._

_You're gonna have to help with this present, if I do it by myself I'll probably burn it by accident of something. And no, she hasn't quite done it yet, but it won't take her long! At least I can reset it to open a different way once she's cracked it once, that way she'll have something to keep her busy for the next two months._

_You better be at the ball. Make Ly and Lorcan come too – if they try making up excuses, tell them I'll set Rose on them, that should scare them enough._

_-Scorp_

After sending Leo's owl back off into the distance, Scorpius flopped down onto his bed. He felt so drained, he just wanted to curl up in a ball and sleep. He planned on doing exactly that, but was disrupted from his thoughts by a quiet knock on the door.

"Scorpius, honey, would you remove the wards so I can come in?" Astoria said through the door. With a sigh and a flick of his wand, Scorpius removed the spells on his door, and his mum walked in.

"I know you are upset, Scorp, but I'm afraid you need to come to terms with it all" Astoria said, sitting beside Scorpius on his bed and pulling him into a hug. Needing the comfort, Scorpius just relaxed into her arms.

"I know, but, it's going to be so different. For all of this year, I've been sharing everything, from my bed to my Christmas and even my wand, with a five-year-old girl" he frowned. "She's too involved in my life now for me to just forget all of this, and I'm terrified she'll wake up and ignore me for the rest of my life!" he said, his voice breaking at the end.

"She won't ignore you, honey. She loves you just as much as you love her-"

"-She loves me in the way a small child loves her older brother, mum. That's what I am to her, another older brother"

"No, you're not, Scorp. You treat her differently. Her real brother, what's his name, Hugo? He loves her in a brotherly way, and he just tolerates her, with the occasional bit of affection. He's the one that got her in this situation in the first place. You on the other hand, actually love her. You give her constant attention and sacrifice everything for her. She loves you in the same way. When you had your injury earlier this year, she wouldn't leave your side until she was told by many people that you would recover. That's love, Scorp. She won't leave you" Astoria said, running her hand gently through her son's short, soft hair. She paused as her hand ran over his scar, a rough, protruding slash right across the back of his head.

"It looks awful" Scorpius scowled. "It won't go away. Dad says that it'll go with time, but its taking forever."

"It's not that bad, it shows that you have inner strength and courage" Astoria said, "And people might be able to tell you and your dad apart now" she added with a laugh. "You seem better, Scorp. You haven't been this happy in a while. I'm guessing you sent Rose to her family so you didn't hurt her in your…rage" she asked, glancing around the room, which was half destroyed. She muttered a quick _reparo_ and everything jumped back into place.

"While she's gone, have a rest. You haven't had much time to yourself for the last few months, so I'd use this free time wisely. Go and sleep this morning off – I'll wake you in about an hour to go and get Rose" Astoria smiled, standing up and crossing the room to the door. "I mean it, Scorp, get some rest. I know you love her, but Rose can wait for an hour while you regenerate after the stress of today."

"Okay, mum. Just, could you wake me in exactly an hour, please? I don't want her gone too long" Scorpius smiled, yawning slightly as he crawled into his bed. It felt weird, going to sleep alone, after sharing his bed with a small child for the last 4 months. But nonetheless, Scorpius fell straight asleep as soon as he closed his eyes.


	25. Chapter 25

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"I mean it, Scorp, get some rest. I know you love her, but Rose can wait for an hour while you regenerate after the stress of today."

"Okay, mum. Just, could you wake me in exactly an hour, please? I don't want her gone too long" Scorpius smiled, yawning slightly as he crawled into his bed. It felt weird, going to sleep alone, after sharing his bed with a small child for the last 4 months. But nonetheless, Scorpius fell straight asleep as soon as he closed his eyes.

* * *

Scorpius apparated to the Burrow under an hour later to find Rose sat silent on the sofa, her arms crossed.

"Scorp'us!" she screeched as she noticed her, standing up and charging towards him. She was very angry, and Scorpius was genuinely scared. "You said you wouldn't be long and you've been gone HOURS!" she screamed up to him, pummelling him with her fists. She didn't quite know that the area she was punching wasn't quite up for punching, so gasped as the blonde towering over her keeled over backwards, muttering under his breath in angry tones.

"Rosie, apologise!" Al scolded, kneeling down and helping Scorpius to his feet, who was staring at the floor with slight anger in his eyes.

"Sorry, Scorp'us. I didn't mean to hurt you that bad" Rose said, breaking into small sobs. Scorpius glanced up and felt his heart break at the little crying girl. He'd made her cry.

"No, Rosie, it's alright, I just….wasn't expecting you to be able to punch that high up" he said sheepishly, rubbing his balls. He scooped the little girl into his arms and said to her tear-stained face "I'm sorry I got cross, it's just that isn't really a place to hit anyone as it hurts a lot. Your cousin Al and your brother will know exactly what I'm talking about" he smirked at the a fore mentioned boys. "I'm sorry I didn't come very quickly, but I needed to have a little bit of time away from everyone so I could clear my head. But I'm here now, so stop worrying" he said, running his fingers gently through the little girl's red curls as she snuggled into his chest from his lap.

"Scorp, I take it you're alright now, then?" Hugo asked hesitantly.

"I'm good, Hugh, just needed some space and sleep" Scorpius smiled. "Now, we need to plan our little trip, don't we?" he grinned.

"What trip?" Rose asked eagerly. "It sounds like it's going to be fun!"

"It'll be wicked, Rosie, hun. Has mummy ever taken you to a proper witches dress shop?" Lily asked.

"Noooooo…what do you do?" Rose turned to Lily, who sat down on the floor by the fire. Rose crawled over and sat in her cousin's lap.

"Well, they take all your measurements and then POOF! About a million different party dresses appear in front of you! You get to try them all on and then when you've picked out your favourite, you get to look at all their sparkly shoes and all their pretty jewellery!" Lily beamed. Rose's eyes lit up at the word 'sparkly'.

"Are we going shopping tomorrow then?"

"Yeah, hun" Scrorpius said, sitting beside Lily on the floor. "We need to get you a pretty party dress for a big ball that you're going to on New Year's Eve."

"Is it a grown up party?"

"Yes, hun, so you need to have a pretty dress and you get to dance with me all night" Scorpius grinned. Rose beamed up at him.

"And you get to dance with me!" Hugo interrupted.

"And me" Al added.

"And me" came a new voice from the door. Scorpius, Al, Hugo, Lily and Rose turned to face Draco Malfoy, who stood leaning on the doorframe.

"Dad? What are you doing here?" Scorpius said, worried.

"I'm taking you for a walk so I can talk to you" he stated, turning around and indicating towards the front door.

"Nah-uh, Draco, Scorp'us isn't going anywhere" Rose said, sitting on Scorpius's lap, preventing him from easily getting up. "He only just got here and he's not going away again" she said defiantly.

"Rose, I have to speak to Scorpius. I will only go outside with him. We'll be five minutes, then you can have my son back" Draco smirked at how this small girl had managed to wrap his son around her little finger.

"I'll be five minutes, hun. You can watch us out of the window if you're worried" Scorpius said, lifting Rose into Lily's lap and standing up.

Scorpius followed his dad out of the Burrow door and into their vast yard. They kept walking until they were a fair distance from the house, but still within the view of Rose, who was staring at them out of the window.

"Are you alright, son?" Draco asked, studying his son, who was only shorter than him by a few inches.

"After this morning? Yeah, I guess I'm doing okay, Dad", Scorpius sighed, "It's just that it finally hit me that she might not remember a thing and I'll just have to erase her from my life! I just don't want her to be gone quite yet." Scorpius bowed his head, trying not to cry in front of his dad.

"I know it must be hard for you, Scorp, but you have to just hope in these situations that everything will be fine in the end. Anyway, I thought I'd bring you out here for another reason" Draco said, smirking. "You want Rose to remember a brilliant Malfoy Ball, yes?"

"Well, duh" Scorpius smirked back.

"Obviously. But I think we should leave it to be a surprise, so I think it would be an idea if you and Rose stayed out of the house from the day before the ball" Draco said.

"I can't expect her family to cater for me again" Scorpius frowned, "They've done so much for us."

"Then go to one of your friends. Take her to see Leo or something. And you could always take her to your grandparents' house" Draco suggested. "I have to be going, but before I forget, here's this" he said, handing Scorpius an envelope.

Scorpius opened it and stared at the contents. "And this is for…?"

"Rose's dress. Get a specially made one. And make sure you tell the retailer that you want it so it can be enlarged later on in the year. I'm away on a course tomorrow so I won't see you before you go shopping " Draco smiled as his son glanced down at the amount of money in his hands.

"Dad, I doubt Rose will want to use the dress again. By the time there's another party, she won't want to wear it again."

"Oh, but there is a party soon and yes she definitely will want to use it" Draco's eyes sparkled.

"Daaaaaad what aren't you telling me" Scorpius groaned as Draco walked away from him.

"Wait and see!" Draco yelled over his shoulder, waving his hand above his head before his apparated away.

Scorpius shook his head and trudged back into the Burrow, only to have Rose wrap her arms around his knees, bringing him to the ground.

"Rosie" Scorpius groaned as the girl sat on his stomach and glared down at him.

"Where did Draco go?" she asked straight away.

"Dunno, but he hasn't gone home. He's going on a trip son you won't see him for a day or two" Scorpius said, sitting up slowly. "But speaking of home, we had better go as we have some things to do!" he said, standing up and taking Rose's hand.

"What are we doing?" she asked curiously.

"You are going to learn how to dance" Scorpius grimaced. "See you tomorrow, Al, Hugo, Lily" he nodded to each before turning on the spot and apparating himself and Rose back to the manor.

* * *

"Scorp'us, I can't do this" Rose whined an hour later as she once again tripped over and crashed into Scorpius.

"Rosie, hun, you have to be able to dance at the ball. I always have to dance first as it's my ball, and I want to dance with you" Scorpius explained as best he could that the hosts always danced first.

"But I can't dance" Rose whined again.

Scorpius sighed. Rose really wasn't getting much better at this. But he suddenly had an idea. He picked up the small girl and positioned her so she was sat on his hip. He put one of her hands on his shoulder, and took her other small hand in his own. He slowly started to waltz around the room, spinning them round and round in graceful circles.

"This is much more fun!" Rose laughed, squealing as Scorpius spun her round and round.

"You can dance, Rosie" Scorpius grinned a little while later as he set Rose down on her feet. "I dunno about you, but I'm quite hungry after all that dancing! Let's go and get some dinner."


	26. Chapter 26

**In the Previous Chapter…**

He picked up the small girl and positioned her so she was sat on his hip. He put one of her hands on his shoulder, and took her other small hand in his own. He slowly started to waltz around the room, spinning them round and round in graceful circles.

"This is much more fun!" Rose laughed, squealing as Scorpius spun her round and round.

"You can dance, Rosie" Scorpius grinned a little while later as he set Rose down on her feet. "I dunno about you, but I'm quite hungry after all that dancing! Let's go and get some dinner."

* * *

The next morning found Rose, Scorpius, Al, Hugo and Lily walking together through Diagon Alley.

"What about Madam Malkins?" Al asked.

"Godric, no, Al! Although they do stuff for all occasions, we need to go somewhere more specific. Like here. Inside!" Lily marshalled the group inside the small boutique.

"Mademoiselle Delacour's?" Scorpius frowned.

"Bonjour, Lily, ma chere! Comment allez-vous?" the lady at the counter said, her face lighting up at the sight of Lily. She walked around the counter and embraced Lily in a loving embrace

"Gabrielle! Bounjour! Je suis tres bien, merci beaucoup!" Lily beamed. She turned to see Hugo, Scorpius and Rose staring at her as if she had turned into a different creature.

"Lils speaks fluent French" Al said. "Hi, Gabrielle, it's nice to see you again" he smiled, hugging Gabrielle too.

"It is nice to see you again too, Albus" Gabrielle smiled, hugging Al back. "Who are your friends?"

"Gabrielle, you must remember Hugo" Al pointed him out.

"Oh, sorry Hugo! I did not recognise you! You have shot up since I last saw you! You must have been quite small then!" Gabrielle said, shocked that she had not recognised him. "I must come and see your family soon. How is Rosie?"

"You can ask her yourself" Al beamed. "Gabrielle, this is my friend Scorpius Malfoy and in his arms is Rosie."

"How?" Gabrielle asked, confused beyond extent. Lily launched into an explanation in French whilst the boys regrouped. Once Lily had finished explaining, Gabrielle nodded and turned to them, asking "So, what can I do to help today?"

* * *

3 hours later, the group left Gabrielle's boutique and headed for Florean Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlour. Scorpius carried Rose's purchases while Lily carried hers. After hours of trying on different dresses with different shoes and with different accessories, they had left with a complete outfit for both girls. Rose had picked a pale pink ball gown that was embellished with silvery diamante jewels scattered all over it, clustering around the waist. It contrasted very well with her red hair, and Lily thought it looked amazing. Lily had finished the look off with some sparkly silver ballet pumps and some small silver trinket jewellery. Scorpius' wallet felt a lot lighter once they had left.

Lily herself had chosen to get a dark green dress that hugged her body, flaring out at the knees. Although it was simple, Lily passed it off well and it looked stunning on her when she wore black heels and an emerald pendant she had fallen in love with.

The 5 were sat eating their ice creams with their bags at their feet when Leo, Lorcan and Lysander walked through the doors. They easily spotted Scorpius, whose platinum hair stood out a mile off. They also recognised him by the fact that Rose was sat in his lap, playing with his fingers.

"You went to Delacour's? Bet your wallet's a bit lighter now" Leo grinned.

"It did feel quite light, but not anywhere near as light as it would have been without Lily's discount" Scorpius said, hoping to save his friend's manhood from Lily's piercing glare. "Mademoiselle Delacour is Fleur Weasley's sister, and she gets on well with Lils, so we got quite a big discount" he said, thanking Lily once again.

"Oh, well, anyway…I got the things you asked for in your letter" Leo said, dumping a bag onto the floor by Scorpius' leg. Rose instinctively dived towards it, eager to find out what it was, but was a bit surprised to find the bag no longer on the floor, but high above her in the air.

"Nuh-uh, missy, that's for Scorp's eyes only" Leo grinned, his wand levitating the bag out of her reach. "I've put a list in there of the things you need to find as well."

"Okay, thanks Leo" Scorpius smiled, taking the bag from the air by his shoulder and putting it on the floor. "Rosie, don't go looking please, it's just for me. I've started finding things out but might need a hand at sweeping out the manor" he grinned.

"Yeah sorry mate, but to this is as far as my help goes" Leo grinned.

"Lazy git just doesn't want to get up off his arse and do physical work" Scorpius muttered under his breath.

"Anyway, we've got to go, but we'll see you at the ball" Lorcan smiled, dragging Leo and Lysander away. Just as they reached the door, Leo ran back to their table, grabbed Scorpius' ice cream from his hand and yelled "I forgot my payment!" over his shoulder as he danced out of Scorpius' reach, exiting the shop.

"You can have mine, Scorp'us" Rose smiled, climbing back into Scorpius' lap to offer him her ice cream.

"I'll be fine, hun, but don't worry, I'll get Leo back eventually" he smirked down at her.

* * *

Later that day, Scorpius and Rose had returned back to the Manor and were currently in the ballroom. This was where the ball would be held in a few days' time, and was perfect for a big party, as it was a spacious room with beautiful architecture and a set of glass doors opened up in to the garden. The ballroom had so far been left untouched, so Scorpius wanted to take Rose inside to practice before they were banned from being there while they decorated it for the ball.

Rose had decided that since she was practicing for the ball, she may as well dress up for a pretend ball, so was currently in Scorpius' arms in her pink gown being waltzed around the large room to some music coming from a gramophone in the corner.

After a while, Scorpius put her on the floor and started to spin her around like a ballet dancer, twirling her around on her tiptoes.

"I feel like a ballerina!" Rose laughed as Scorpius spun her around again.

"You look like one, hun" Scorpius smiled.

"I met I'm a ballerina than you, though" Rose laughed.

"Oh really?" he smirked, challenging her by raising his eyebrow.

Draco walked in a while later to find Rose sat on the floor in a fit of giggled while his son pranced around the room, occasionally spinning on his tiptoes or doing an arabesque. "What on earth are you doing, Scorp?" he asked, not even trying to hide to pure shock in his voice. Scorpius turned to face his father, mid arabesque, and immediately straightened up and walked over, scooping Rose up along the way.

"I was proving to Rosie that I'm a better ballerina than her" he shrugged, a grin working its way onto his face.

"Well, I never expected I'd see you prancing around like a ballet dancer when you were younger, but definitely not at 17" Draco laughed. "I just came to find you to say that your grandparents have invited us over for dinner, so make Rose presentable as they aren't going to be overly…happy…about her presence anyway. You may want to change her out of that expensive dress though."

"Oh! Of course, dad. We'll just go change" Scorpius nodded, shocked, taking Rose off to his room.

* * *

Rose huddled into Scorpius' chest as they walked with Draco and Astoria up the driveway of his grandparents' house. Scorpius hugged her close, offering his support. He never really had liked his grandparents' house, as it scared him as a child.

After the war, Narcissa had refused to continue living in Malfoy Manor, for it held too many bad memories, so had forced Lucius to move into a 'much nicer place'. Their manor was not quite as big as Malfoy Manor, but looked very scary and domineering from the outside. The once welcoming golden-brown stones were covered in large patches of black and grey, scorched beyond repair. The manor had been abandoned for centuries after it was damaged by fiendfyre in a duel between its previous owner and an angry neighbour.

"It looks scary, hun, but it's really not once you get inside" Scorpius attempted to soothe the little girl as they got closer and closer to the front steps.

"It's still scary" Rose murmured.

"Hun, I wouldn't bring you here if I thought you were in danger, okay? Just remember I love you and that I won't let anyone hurt you" he said, kissing her gently on the forehead.

Their heads shot up at the sound of a gasp and the sound of someone falling to the ground. Scorpius exchanged a glance with his parents and knew that this was going to take some explaining.

It appeared at Lucius had been standing by the door as his son, daughter-in-law and grandson walked up his driveway, and had overheard Scorpius talking to the tiny girl in his arms. Scorpius hadn't seen his grandparents since his 13th birthday, as they had been travelling the globe twice since, revisiting old friends in different countries, and any time that they were back from travelling, he was at school, so couldn't see them.

Narcissa rushed out of the door, kneeling by her husband. She looked quite tanned (Scorpius made a mental note to ask her where their recent holiday had taken them) as she glanced up at Scorpius, her own eyes narrowing in shock. She stood to her full height and walked past Draco and Astoria, stopping in front of Scorpius. She looked him up and down, before turning to Draco and smiling, saying "I should scold you for not telling me that I'm a great-grandmother, least to say that I obviously have been for quite a few years!" she said, her voice graduating to a shriek by the end of her sentence. Draco looked dumbfounded at her words.

"Great-grandmother?" he asked, clueless.

"Granny, please, you have it all wrong" Scorpius said, finally fitting all the pieces together. His granddad fainting after overhearing his last few words to Rose, his grandmother thinking she were a great-grandmother, it made a bit of sense now. "Granny, this is Rose Weasley. I can see by your lovely tan that you haven't been in the country for a while, so I'm guessing you won't have heard about this…" Scorpius quickly explained their situation from the beginning, about how Rose was de-aged and put into his care until February. Narcissa nodded as his story went on, taking her right through everything. Once Scorpius had finished, Narcissa smiled at Rose, who was still hiding in Scorpius' jacket.

"Hello, Rose. I'm Scorpius' granny. You can call me Granny too, if you like" she beamed.

"Hello, Granny" Rose said timidly.

"How old are you, Rose?"

"5"

Narcissa raised her eyebrows. "You looked a little younger at first, hidden away in Scorpius' coat." She suddenly had an idea, quickly glancing down at her husband, who was still lying face down on the ground. "Rose, can you call Scorpius daddy for me whenever my husband is around?" she grinned.

* * *

**A/N: Hehehe i've written the next chapter...but you can only have it if you review! You love me really!-Rxx**


	27. Chapter 27

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"How old are you, Rose?"

"5"

Narcissa raised her eyebrows. "You looked a little younger at first, hidden away in Scorpius' coat." She suddenly had an idea, quickly glancing down at her husband, who was still lying face down on the ground. "Rose, can you call Scorpius daddy for me whenever my husband is around?" she grinned.

* * *

Draco, Astoria and Scorpius all raised their eyebrows.

"You want us to pretend that Rose is Scorp's daughter?" Draco said, his voice sounding restrained.

"Yes, Draco. I haven't had an opportunity to trick your father like this in years!" Narcissa said gleefully. "You should play along with it too. Rose, can you call Draco and Astoria Granddad and Granny?"

"Why?" Rose questioned, confused.

"Hun, Granny wants to play a trick on granddad. He thinks that I'm your daddy. It's hard to explain how he came to that conclusion, but we're going to have a little fun with it" Scorpius explained.

"Alright, Draco, could you levitate your father inside and place him on the sofa in the hall, seeming as he doesn't appear to have recovered from the shock yet" Narcissa scowled slightly. "Then we can all go and have a nice cup of tea and a chat in the lounge while we wait for dinner to be cooked."

* * *

Lucius walked in, rubbing a bump on his head, while Narcissa, Draco, Astoria, Scorpius and Rose were chatting over tea and cake in the lounge. Lucius seemed to have to double take several times to confirms that yes, Rose was sat on Scorpius' lap, happily playing with a little toy, and yes, she was a tiny child, probably no more than 3 years old.

"Lucius, I see you've finally joined us" Narcissa beamed, moving over to make space for him to sit next to her. "I believe that you have someone new to welcome" she indicated Rose.

"What's your name, child?" Lucius said.

"Father, be nice" Draco scolded.

"Granddad, this is Rose" Scorpius said, beaming down at the girl in his arms. Lucius almost fainted again at the amount of love he could see in his grandson's eyes. This child must be his.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Rose" he said in a shaky voice.

"It's nice to meet you too…"

"Great-granddad" Scorpius helpfully finished for her, smirking. His comment had the desired effect. Lucius paled and his hands shook. He leant back in his chair and put his hand over his eyes, muttering to himself. Rose climbed off of Scorpius' lap and surprised Lucius even more by climbing into his lap. He glanced down at the child.

"Rose, come back here, hun" Scorpius said, reaching his arms out, winking at Rose.

Understanding Scorpius' wink, Rose replied "Yes, daddy" before snuggling into his chest.

Lucius looked lost for words as he watched Scorpius wrap his arms around Rose, hugging her tight. This movement, although fitting for their joke, had become a natural movement for Scorpius in the last few months.

"So…Scorpius…" Lucius finally said, clearing his throat loudly, "How old is Rose?"

"I'm 5" Rose said boldly. You could almost hear the clogs turning in Lucius' brain as he did the maths. Several second passed, everyone waiting for Lucius to notice the slip up.

Eventually, Narcissa had enough of her husband attempting to work it out, and said loudly "That would make Scorp a father at 12, Lucius." Lucius stared in shock at Scorpius, still not getting that it was a joke.

"Granddad, this is Rose _Weasley_" Scorpius said, emphasising the Weasley part of her name.

"YOU GOT A WEALSEY PREGNANT AT 12?" Lucius practically screamed at Scorpius, jumping up from the sofa.

"No, you idiot, honestly, how stupid do you get?" Narcissa said, pulling her husband back down to sit on the sofa before saying "This is Rose Weasley, as is Ron and Hermione Weasley's daughter" she said.

"But…their daughter is in Scorpius' year…" Lucius muttered, another idea hitting his brain as he said it. "You're stuck looking after the girl as you cursed her, didn't you, boy?"

"What, no! I didn't curse Rose!" Scorpius spluttered. "She got slipped a potion by accident and McGonagall put her in my care considering that Mr and Mrs Weasley are too important to the ministry for them to take 6 months off to look after their child again! It sounds ridiculous, but Ron is in charge of the Auror Department with Harry and Hermione controls the Law and Order departments. The ministry wouldn't be able to afford to lose them!" he said.

"So you have been burdened with this child until she can be reaged. Or are you stuck with her forever?" Lucius grinned wickedly. "It must be torture, having to care for a Weasley."

"Back off, father" Draco warned, but too late, the damage was done.

"You have no right to insult Rose and her family like that!" Scorpius yelled, standing. "Rose is probably the best thing that has happened to me this last year. She loves me unconditionally and I love her too! Her family rose above their prejudices and befriended me and I spent the first week of my Christmas with them!" he said, taking a worried Rose's hand in his own. "If you can't rise above your prejudices like them, then we are no longer staying. It was lovely to see you, Granny. Dad, Mum, I'm taking Rose home" he said, giving no one the chance to stop him by apparating back to Malfoy Manor.

Scorpius looked down to see Rose on the brink of tears. "Hun, I'm sorry, but I couldn't stay there. He was being so mean and heartless" he soothed Rose, picking her up and cradling her in his arms.

"I know, daddy" Rose giggled. "Your granddad's face was really funny when I said that" she laughed.

"His reaction was brilliant" Scorpius agreed. He walked Rose down the halls and into the kitchen, where Dipsey was washing dishes at the sink with magic, humming a little tune to herself. She jumped in shock and dropped a plate when Scorpius and Rose walked in.

"Sorry to surprise you, Dipsey" Scorpius said, pointing his wand at the broken plate, mending it together, "But it looks like me and Rose will be having dinner here tonight." Dipsey carried on cleaning while Scorpius put Rose down on a stool and gravitated to their cutlery drawer. Although he could easily cook, Scorpius wasn't in the mood, so scooped up a handful of muggle takeaway menus and sat next to Rose.

"Have you had a muggle takeaway before, hun?"

"Nope. Mummy always said they're unhealthy" Rose said.

"Well, they might be a bit unhealthy, but how about we get one for a treat tonight?"

"What is a muggle takeaway? Mummy just said they were unhealthy…"

"Well, you can have anything really. You can have pizza, chips, chicken, Chinese, Indian, anything" Scorpius explained, passing Rose the multi-coloured fliers. Rose leafed through them, looking at the pictures. "What would you like, hun?"

"Well, I've never had a lot of this before…" Rose said, a bit confused by all the names. "You choose!"

"Well, have you had any Chinese stuff before?" Rose shook her head. "Well, we'll get some of that then!" Scorpius apparated Rose to a nearby muggle town, and they soon found the nearest Chinese takeaway. While Scorpius ordered, Rose looked around, amazed by the variety of new smells she was experiencing. After staring transfixed at a cat with a waving arm for a while, Rose looked up to see Scorpius handing over weird money in return for their food.

"Is that muggle money?" she asked. The shop keeper looked at Rose strangely, and she suddenly remembered that she was in a muggle town, not a wizard one. Scorpius quickly took her out of the shop and in the nearest back street apparated them home.

"Rosie, you know the rules" Scorpius scolded lightly. "You shouldn't mention magic in front of muggles. Oh well, he'll pass it off as a game or something. Anyway, yeah, that was muggle money. I'll show you it a bit later, after we've eaten."

* * *

Chinese takeaway instantly became Rose's favourite foods. She savoured every bite of every flavour from the small selection of dishes Scorpius had ordered. She decided her favourite one was something Scorpius said was 'chow mein'. When they were clearing up their plates a little while later, after every single mouthful of food had been eaten, they heard two pops in the hall.

Draco and Astoria appeared, looking disgruntled. "You could have said a proper goodbye, Scorp" Astoria sighed, sitting down on the stool next to Rose.

"Sorry mum, but he went too far" Scorpius tried to argue.

"We know, son, but- Have you had Chinese?" Draco said, sniffing midsentence and instantly forgetting what he was going to say.

"Yeah, sorry. Rose and I ate all of it. She's never had a Chinese before now, so I just let her eat what she wanted, which happened to be most of it" Scorpius smirked as Rose blushed in front of him.

"Appetite like your father's then, Rosie" Draco grinned. He turned to Rose as she did a massive yawn. "You've had a long day, Scorp. Take Rose to bed" he sighed.

Scorpius picked Rose up, turning to leave. "Night, mum, dad" he said, exiting with an already half-asleep Rose huddled into his chest, holding on to him by winding an arm around his neck.


	28. Chapter 28

**In the Previous Chapter…**

"Sorry mum, but he went too far" Scorpius tried to argue.

"We know, son, but- Have you had Chinese?" Draco said, sniffing midsentence and instantly forgetting what he was going to say.

"Yeah, sorry. Rose and I ate all of it. She's never had a Chinese before now, so I just let her eat what she wanted, which happened to be most of it" Scorpius smirked as Rose blushed in front of him.

"Appetite like your father's then, Rosie" Draco grinned. He turned to Rose as she did a massive yawn. "You've had a long day, Scorp. Take Rose to bed" he sighed.

Scorpius picked Rose up, turning to leave. "Night, mum, dad" he said, exiting with an already half-asleep Rose huddled into his chest, holding on to him by winding an arm around his neck.

* * *

Scorpius and Rose spent the whole of the next day at Leo's house. Leo had lots of pet animals, including 3 dogs, 2 cats and 12 chickens. Rose had only had one cat, and that was Crookshanks 2, who never liked her and scratched her a lot, so she was overjoyed by Leo's cats and dogs, all of which were competing for her attention.

"We're just going to go and have a man-chat, hun. We'll be upstairs if you need us" Scorpius said, quickly ushering Leo from the room. Once they were out of earshot, Scorpius turned to Leo and said "I searched my house last night and could only find a few photos, but I managed to get loads off of Al, Hugo, Lily and Rose's parents. Apparently they've been taking loads over the break. I bought the stuff too – I knew she'd love your dogs" he grinned.

"Let's get to work on this then" Leo said, leading Scorpius to his bedroom.

Scorpius emptied the contents of the bag Leo had given to him the day before on the floor. In the pile, there was a blank photo album, about 50 photos and a ton of craft materials like glue, glitter and sequins. The pair set to work, quickly sifting through the photos and slipping them into the protective pockets in the photo album, only half-filling it. Scorpius quickly duplicated the album, slipping one into his bag. "I want a copy of the photos before we give them to her" he explained. They then decorated the blank front of the album with all of the sparkly craft materials, leaving space for gold letters to form the words "Rose Weasley".

Leo quickly hid the finished album under his bed and vanished the craft stuff as they heard Rose bounding up the stairs. Scorpius was planning to give the album to Rose as a gift when she woke up after being re-aged.

"What've you been doing?" she asked as she walked in.

"Just talking, hun. Have you been having fun with Leo's dogs?"

"Yeah! I really want a dog now! But mummy probably won't let me have one"

"Oh well. Did you want something, Rosie, or did you just come up here to see us?"

"I wanted to come and play with you"

"Well, there's not much to do here. Leo, is there anything nearby we can do with Rose?"

"Well, there's a park down the road, we can always go for a walk. We can take the dogs as well" he grinned.

* * *

Minutes later, Scorpius and Leo were running down the road, sprinting after Rose, who was currently being dragged by one of Leo's dogs towards the park.

"Accio Rose!" Scorpius shouted, pointing his wand at the flying girl. Rose's tiny body jerked backwards straight into Scorpius, knocking the pair to the ground. Leo's dog came flying with Rose on the lead, knocking Leo off his feet as well.

"Wooooaah that was so cool!" came a voice from across the road. Scorpius and Leo's heads snapped up, searching for the owner of the voice. They stood up, and looked around to see a small boy standing across the road, staring at them.

"Shit, that's a muggle kid" Leo muttered. "Make up something, and fast!" he said as a kid ran towards them.

"Ummmm…" Scorpius searched for words.

"Are you a magician?" the little boy asked. He only looked about 8 years old. He short black hair, was quite tall and was staring with awe at Scorpius.

"Yeah!" Rose cried before Scorpius could stop her. "Scorp's a wizard!"

"Really?"

"Yeah, he can do loads of things! He can…"

"I think that's enough, hun" Scorpius said, putting his hand over her little mouth. After doing Muggle Studies for his 3rd and 4th years at Hogwarts, he knew what the little kid was thinking. "I'm sorry, kid, but you know, a wizard never gives away his secrets. What's your name?"

"I'm Sam"

"Well, Sam, do you like magic tricks?"

"Yeah!"

"Look, watch this" Scorpius said. He reached forwards, put his hand behind Sam's ear, then pulled his hand back, revealing a muggle 50p coin. "That's magic for you" he grinned. "Now, we've got to go, but Sam, can you keep the fact that I can do magic tricks a secret please?"

"Yeah, sure mister!" the boy said, looking down at the coin with a grin. "Can I keep this?"

"Yeah, go for it" Scorpius said, before walking away with Rose on his shoulders, dragging Leo by his sleeve.

* * *

Once they were at the park, Leo let his dog off the lead, and Scorpius let Rose run after him. He muttered a quick boundary spell to make sure that they both stayed within 10m of him, then sat down next to Leo on the grass.

"Explain" was all Leo said.

"Basically, muggle's have these people called magicians. They're basically illusionists, but muggle children are made to believe it's 'magic' until they are old enough to see it's all a trick. It's a good cover up if you use magic in front of muggle children by accident, actually. The trick I did with the coin – that's a standard muggle trick. You hold a coin in your hand, but don't reveal it until you've drawn your hand from the back of their head. They believe you've conjured it out of thin air" Scorpius explained.

"Did you have the muggle coin in your hand already, or did you actually conjure it?" Leo joked.

"Neither. Summoned it from my room" Scorpius laughed.

"Well, as cool as it looked to the kid, that was soooo close" Leo said.

"I'm surprised that we haven't had any mail yet to be honest" Scorpius muttered, thinking deeply.

Just as the words left his mouth, a red envelope fluttered down out of the tree above them into his lap.

"Shit, we need to leave, now" Leo said.

"That's from my dad, it's got his writing on the front" Scorpius said. He called Rose, scooped her up and ran. They ran all the way back to Leo's, the envelope getting hotter and starting to smoke in Sorpius' hand, burning him. As the door slammed close, the letter burst open.

* * *

**A/N: Hello! I'm (temporarily) back! Updates will be random i'm afraid as still have 16 exams to go...keep reviewing and I will try to update as regularly as i can! - Rxx**


	29. Chapter 29

**In the previous chapter…**

Just as the words left his mouth, a red envelope fluttered down out of the tree above them into his lap.

"Shit, we need to leave, now" Leo said.

"That's from my dad, it's got his writing on the front" Scorpius said. He called Rose, scooped her up and ran. They ran all the way back to Leo's, the envelope getting hotter and starting to smoke in Scorpius' hand, burning him. As the door slammed close, the letter burst open.

* * *

"SCORPIUS HYPERION MALFOY, YOU HAD BETTER COME HOME RIGHT NOW AND EXPLAIN TO ME WHY I HAVE HARRY POTTER KNOCKING ON MY DOOR ASKING TO TALK TO YOU. Oh, but come to the library, nowhere near the ballroom." The envelope disintegrated in Scorpius' hand. There was a stunned silence as the three of them watched the ashes crumble to the floor, Draco Malfoy's words ringing in their ears.

"Harry Potter" Leo mumbled

"at my door" Scorpius finished. Realisation dawned on his face. "Harry Potter's at my door asking to talk to me. Ooooooh crap. Rose honey, we have to go. Leo, apparate to my room later and I'll fill you in" he rushed to say as he scooped Rose into his arms and jumped into the floo.

Harry Potter was stood by the fireplace in the Malfoy library when Scorpius and Rose flew out of the fire and straight into him.

"Uncle Harry!" Rose smiled, hugging the man that she was currently sat on.

"Sorry, Mr Potter, misjudged the floo" Scorpius muttered, picking himself off of the floor, before offering the older man a hand.

"S'fine" he smiled. "I have a few things I wanted to talk about. One of them is ministry related…"

Scorpius visibly paled.

"…and the other is Rose related. The ministry one was the reason I was sent here, so I'll start with that. Why did you use magic in front of a muggle child?"

"You did WHAT?!" Draco practically screamed.

"I used magic to prevent Rose from being killed and a muggle kid saw. I then did another tiny bit of magic to get rid of the child and told him I was a magician" Scorpius mumbled.

"Well, it was a foolish thing to do, but you did ok this time as you managed to cover your tracks. Just, don't do it again, yeah?" Harry grinned. "Which trick did you do?"

"The appearing coin trick"

"Ahhh I remember that one…" Harry started, but was interrupted by a sharp cough from Draco in the corner. "Oh yes, the other thing about Rose…"

"Is something wrong?"

"No, no, nothing is wrong, it's just that McGonagall wanted me to tell you that the potion is actually going to be ready early, and that Rose can take it and return to her rightful age on January 10th. That's the first Saturday back at school, so you will have her for just less than 2 weeks."

"That's…..great" Scorpius said, a sad smile forming on his face. "Rose can get on with her life and catch up with all the NEWT stuff before exams"

"Yes, everything will be back to normal. I do hope that she remembers this, Scorpius. You've done so much for her." Harry said, smiling reassuringly. "Anyway, her second childhood should go out with a bang – you have a ball tonight, remember"

"Yeah. Well, thanks for coming to tell us. McGonagall's office at 10am on Saturday 10th, yeah?"

"Yes. We'll talk over all the arrangements for you two catching up on studies then, and we will go down to the Hospital Wing to administer the potion. I had better be going, but I shall see you tomorrow at the ball" Harry said. He hugged Rose, said goodbye to the two Malfoys and flooed home.

Scorpius sank into a chair with Rose on his lap. 11 days. That was all he had left.

**A/N: Shorter than normal, but I thought I'd give you this chapter as a promise that I am still here and still writing! Next chapter is currently being written, so keep up any faith you have in me and keep reviewing! -Rxx**


	30. Chapter 30

**In the previous chapter…**

11 days. That was all he had left.

* * *

_An hour later…_

Rose had left with Harry to go and get ready at the Burrow with her cousins for the ball later that evening, and so Scorpius was left by himself to mope in his room. Leo found him curled up on his bed, head buried in his pillows, when he popped out of the fireplace.

"Scorp, man, what's up? "

"Potion's ready early. Only got 11 days"

"Ah. Well, that sucks a bit. But you can't be miserable tonight – Rose won't have a good time if you don't enjoy tonight, forget what's coming in the future for now, yeah?"

"Yeah, I guess."

* * *

"Rosie! It's time to get ready" Lily sung as she opened the door to her room. "Rosie!" she scolded, seeing that the small girl had decided to try out Lily's make-up without her, her face plastered in lip stick, eye shadows of many colours and a stripe of black mascara on each cheek. "Now we have to get this mess cleared up, we're gonna be late!" She slyly took her wand from her pocket and gave it a wave, the make up instantly returning to its rightful place, and all of the various colours and marks disappearing off of Rose's face. "Right, now that we're not going to be late, let's get ready for the party!"

2 hours later, Rose stood hand in hand with Hugo in front of the fireplace. They were going to floo to the Manor with Lily, Albus and a groaning James, who were also attending the Ball.

"Ready Rosie?" Hugo asked, gazing down on his older sister.

"Yeah! I wanna go to Scorp'us' ball!" she said. With that, Hugo scooped Rose up, resting her on his hip, then walked into the green flames in the grate.

"Malfoy Manor!" Rose heard him loudly say before they were surrounded by green flames that gently licked against her body. The next thing she knew, the flames fell away from them, revealing the hallway in the Manor. Rose looked around, scanning the people milling about for her dance partner, but could not spot the blond anywhere.

* * *

Scorpius stood anxiously by the fireplace, waiting for the green flames to erupt in the grate to reveal Rose. He cast a quick tempus charm, just to see that it showed 7:01, just like it had the last 4 times he had checked it. They were late. Rose was probably to blame for this, so he didn't worry a lot, but still, they were late.

Suddenly, his world went dark. He felt around to see who had covered his eyes, but found no one. He felt someone place a hand around his wrist before feeling the jerk of apparation. He fell onto something soft, and immediately felt something fasten itself around his wrists as something slightly heavier fell on top of him. His vision cleared, and he recognised his surroundings immediately. His bedroom walls seemed to close in around him, confining his to his bed, where he was pinned underneath Melody Partridge, a 7th year Slytherin who had previously been his girlfriend. Needless to say, he did not want her on top of him, especially on his bed.

"Scorpius, darling, it's been such a while since we've…..had a play date" Meldoy whispered as she snaked her hand down his chest towards his abdomen. He gasped as her cold hand slithered under his waistband, working its way down.

"Get off, Mel" he said, trying to pull his wrists free. The bonds got tighter.

"But Scorpie, we haven't had a chance to play yet" she pouted, sitting up so that she was straddling his hips.

"Melody, please get off. I have to find Rose"

"Oh please, don't tell me you actually care about the little brat? Is she just as irritating as a small child?"

"SHUT UP AND GET OFF ME!"

"Tut tut, Scorpie, where are your manners? Your parents would be very disappointed that you didn't ask nicely"

"Fine. Please shut up and get off me right now!"

"Listen to me, Malfoy" Melody suddenly growled, bending down so her face was inches from his, "you are going to play along with me until I tell you that you can return to your precious Weasley scum." A wand dug into his thigh. "and if you don't" the wand scraped up his thigh painfully so it was sitting at the very top of the inside of his leg "I can guarantee that you will never be able to have kids. Capisce?" she growled, digging the tip of her wand into his flesh.

Scorpius howled in pain. Wherever the wand had travelled, his skin split open into a deep cut, blood instantly pooling onto the fabric of his trousers and shirt, staining them red. His vision blurred again, this time from pain. He saw the door fly off its hinges with a bang, hitting the wall on the opposite side of the room. He felt Melody's body being thrown off of him, before seeing a burst of purple light. His last thought before blackness consumed him was that he was in big trouble.

* * *

Hugo heard it first. He had Rose on his shoulders as she scanned the people in the ballroom for Scorpius. Draco was just walking past him, and obviously heard it too. The sound of a man screaming in unbearable pain. They shared one look before Draco ran towards the staircase. Hugo practically threw Rose at Lily, who was luckily standing next to him, before sprinting after Draco.

"Where's Hugo going?"

"I have no idea, Rosie, we'll have to wait and see when he comes back" Lily said, just as confused as her cousin.

* * *

Draco took the stairs three at a time. He had heard his son cry out like that only once before, and that was after falling from his broom as a child when he broke all the bones in his legs and his pelvis.

Hugo was barely five steps behind. He'd known it was Scorpius the second he saw Draco's head whip round. He practically skidded into Draco as he stopped in front of a door with Scorpius engraved in it.

With a jab of his wand, Draco sent the door flying through the room. He ran towards the bed and threw the girl off of his son just as she jabbed her wand at Scorpius' face. The purple flash momentarily stunned everyone. Then the stench of blood filled his nostrils, nearly making him gag. Scorpius' shirt was half stained red, his trousers also turning brown with the colour of blood. A pool of blood soaked into the sheets around his middle. The sight was enough to make him stun the girl.

Then he saw it.

The blood poured out of Scorpius' head from the wound from earlier in the year. The curse had opened the wound again. Draco rushed to his son's side. He cast a patronus and watched it race out of the room, crashing into Hugo.

"Draco, we need to get him to Mungo's" he said, his voice shaking. He got no response, so he made his way over to the bed. He transfigured the bed sheet into a stretcher and pulled a pillow under Scorpius' head.

His head spun around as he heard a blood curdling scream from the door.

* * *

**A/N: Hellooooo! Sorry for the delay in updating, i've had a hell of a few weeks. I've been so busy that writing got slightly forgotten. Oh well, here's an update for you! and it is quite a substantial length! Enjoy and don;t forget to review! Also, still looking for things to read, so if anyone wants their writing read and reviewed, ask and you shall recieve. aaaaaaaand i'm off! - Rxx**


	31. Chapter 31

**In the previous chapter…**

His head spun around as he heard a blood curdling scream from the door.

* * *

Rose ran to Scorpius' bedside and crumpled into her brother's arms. The tears flowed whilst Draco levitated the stretcher out of the room, and eventually her tears turned into anger. Who had done this to him?

Hugo carried Rose after the stretcher in search of the Potter children, who would help in consoling Rosie. But help found him much sooner in the form of Leo, who ran to his side.

"Hugo, I've just seen Scorp. What the hell happened?"

"Girl called Melody Partridge threw a curse at him and it's opened the wound on his head as well as creating a few more" Hugo explained in a hushed voice. "Unfortunately, Rose followed me up when I went to help Draco, so she's in a bit of a shock at the moment."

"Come here, Rosie" Leo said, taking the sobbing girl into his arms, "We'll go and find Dipsey, yeah, and get you some hot chocolate to warm you up a bit. Hugo, you wanna come too? You don't look the best either."

After a mug of hot chocolate, Rose fell asleep in Leo's lap.

"Poor girl, she shouldn't have had to see him hurt again" Leo said to Hugo.

"I know. How long do you reckon it'll take to heal?"

"Well it took a few days last time, but that was only one gash"

"He's got a massive one up his leg as well now"

"In which case we're looking at about a week for that one. Plus a re-opened wound will take a bit longer. We're looking at about 2 weeks in Mungo's"

"Ah crap"

"What?"

"Rose. She re-ages in just under 2 weeks. How the hell are we gonna explain it to her?"

* * *

Draco sat by his son's bedside and stared down at his son. How had the Partridge girl even gotten into the ball? And what were her motives behind hurting Scorpius? His thoughts diminished to nothing as the door opened, revealing Healer Bones, who walked up to Draco.

"He's in a stable condition, but considering this is a reopened wound plus a new wound, he's gonna be comatose for 10 days. He then has to stay inside Mungo's for at least another day so that we can run tests."

"Is there no way that the process can be shortened?"

"I'm afraid not. This is the only way his body can heal properly. I will keep you updated, Mr Malfoy, but for now, I think you should get some rest yourself."

* * *

Everyone but the Weasleys and Potters had left the Manor after Draco's Patronus had flown through the door, cancelling the ball due to Scorpius' condition. Harry and Ron had quickly got people home, then went to investigate Scorpius' bedroom to look for evidence. They took Melody's stunned form to the Ministry for questioning, leaving the Potter and Weasley children to look after Rose until they heard anything more from Draco.

"He'll be alright, Rosie" Lily said, hugging Rose. "He always is. He's been in so many accidents and he always pulls through"

"But what if he doesn't?"

"Don't say that, Rosie. Scorp will be fine, you'll see"

* * *

Scorpius' head hurt. As in, it _really_ hurt. He tried to open his eyes, but the effort increased the pain. He had just woken from a strange dream. He was in the hospital wing, and for some reason, 17-year-old Rose Weasley was sat by his bedside, holding his hand and talking to him. She stroked little circles onto his palm whilst she spoke, and was looking down at him. She seemed to be crying, but he didn't know why.

But now, the dream was gone, and he couldn't be bothered to open his eyes. He just wanted to go back to sleep so he could go back to his dream to figure it all out.

Then he heard her voice.

"Scorp?"

It was a near whisper, and he was worried he'd imagined it at first.

"Scorp? Scorpius, can you hear me?" She said it louder this time, and with more urgency. He felt someone squeeze his hand. But hang on, was this all still a dream?

There was only one way to find out. Scorpius opened his eyes.

His vision, although blurred at first, slowly cleared. He slowly began to make out that he was in a bed, but was not in the Hospital Wing as he had thought, but was in a St Mungo's ward. He seemed to be the only one in there. His vision cleared more to reveal that a girl was sat on a chair next to him, his hand clutched in her own. A tear slipped from her eye as grey clashed with ocean-blue.

"Scorpius, say something…"

"Where am I, why are you 17 and not 5, why am I here and what day is it?"

"Thank merlin, you are actually awake this time! I've been worried sick!"

"Rose, can you just answer my questions please? I'm so confused"

"You're in Mungos, you got attacked at the New Years' Eve Ball and it's January the 14th…" she said, waiting for the clogs to tick over.

"I've been unconscious for 2 weeks?"

"Yeah. You missed me taking the re-aging potion. It was absolutely foul!" she laughed.

"You can remember it?"

"Oh yeah, I can remember everything from that very first night in September. Scorpius, don't freak, but we do need to talk"

"Ok, well…"

"Not now. You need some rest. That bitch reopened the scar on your head as well as creating a new one. The Healer said that if you woke up today, we can go back to school on Saturday. It's Wednesday today, so that gives us a few days to talk and sort a few things, alright?"

"Ok…" Scorpius started to say, but stopped midsentence as Rose swooped down a hugged her arms around him.

"I'm so glad you're awake" he heard from against his chest. He looked down and saw that Rose was crying. "I…it was hell, those last few days without you. No one would tell me what was happening or how long you'd be out for and I wasn't allowed to see you at all. I was so scared that…" She was crying.

"That what?"

"That you'd leave me. Forever. And you'd promised you'd never leave me"

"I never would have left you, Rose"

"But what if you had? I didn't know how you were doing! The first time I got to see you was Sunday! The potion took up the whole of Saturday, and I was only cleared to see you then next morning!"

"Rose, how much sleep have you had?" Scorpius asked, noticing the bags under her eyes.

"I haven't. I've been here for three days and haven't slept a wink, I was so worried about you that I just couldn't sleep. I sat up and talked to you instead. There was one time yesterday when you opened your eyes, but when you looked at me they were unfocused and you soon drifted back off to sleep. That's why I asked you to say something, so I could tell if you were really awake or if it was just your eyes."

"I think I'm awake, but I'd quite like some more sleep, and I think you would like some too. I know it's probably not allowed, but seeing as it's the middle of the night and we're the only ones here, come here and get some sleep" he smiled weakly, patting the bed beside him.

Rose hesitated, but after seeing the look in Scorpius' eye, she crawled onto the bed beside him. He pulled back the covers and let her wriggle in beside him. He felt her arm drape across his chest and her hand link with his. And then he let sleep engulf him, a smile forming on his face.

* * *

**A/N: Hi y'all! I know that this was a very quick update, but i must say now that in cannot promise for the next chapter to be delivered so quickly! Thanks again for reviews and hope you are all enjoying CHG so far! This story is nearing it's end now (i think) but don;t get too sad, i may do a sequel yet! Keep up the good reading skills and reviews and you shall (eventually) be rewarded! -Rxx **


	32. Chapter 32

**In the previous chapter…**

Rose hesitated, but after seeing the look in Scorpius' eye, she crawled onto the bed beside him. He pulled back the covers and let her wriggle in beside him. He felt her arm drape across his chest and her hand link with his. And then he let sleep engulf him, a smile forming on his face.

* * *

Scorpius woke up to the familiar feeling of someone else sharing his bed. Instinctively, he begun to run his hands gently through the red waves he was so used to stroking in the morning. What was different this time was the soft moan that followed.

"Rose? Are you awake?" Scorpius asked, stopping his hand and opening his eyes to look down on the girl draped over him.

"Yeah, I'm getting there. You know I'm not very good at waking up. Why'd you stop?"

"I can carry on if you want"

"Please. It felt really nice" Rose laughed softly. Scorpius resumed stroking her hair, which was a lot longer and thicker now compared with when Rose was 5. Which reminded him...

"Rose, you said last night we need to talk about everything"

"Mmhmm, but can we get up first? Now I know you're alright I think I can bear to leave you for 20 minutes so I can shower and change my clothes. And a shower wouldn't hurt you either" she giggled.

"Yes Miss Weasley, I think Mr Malfoy would benefit from a shower. And considering that you are both awake and well rested, I think that it is time that you both ate something" came the voice of McGonagall from the door. Both students turned to face her. "Rose, now that Scorpius is definitely awake, I think it would be wise for you to return to school this evening to update the pupils at dinner. You may return here if you wish, seeing as Scorpius must stay here for a few more days and I am sure that you have lots to discuss."

"Yes, Professor. Scorp, I'll run down and grab us something to eat. What would you like?"

"Just a small bit of toast will be alright for me, thanks."

"Okay. I'll be right back" she said, hugging him then getting out of the bed and walking out of the door.

"So how are you feeling, my boy, now that Rose isn't here to hear the worst of it?" McGonagall asked, walking up to him and settling herself in the chair by his bed.

"Well, my head hurts and my leg hurts and I can't remember why I'm here, but Rose said something about me being attacked at the ball"

"That is true. You will probably recognise the name Melody Partridge. She entered the Manor and ambushed you whilst you were waiting for Rose to arrive. She apparated you to your bedroom and attacked you with a curse when your dad found you screaming in pain from the first of the two curses to create the wounds. You were transported here to Mungo's and since then have been unconscious."

"Well, that was definitely not the party I promised Rose then" Scorpius joked.

"No. I will tell you now, her family and your friends ha a very hard time with her for the remainder of her time as a small child. Her parents thought it best that she was not allowed to see you whilst you were still injured as they didn't want her further traumatised."

"Rose said she couldn't see me. She said she hasn't left my side in 3 days, so has she not technically been back to school?"

"No. Rose refused to come back. She said that at this time, you were more of a priority, and that the two of you would make up on lost school time together when you returned. The school has not seen her since she re-aged, so I think that a reappearance at school will be good for everyone. Plus I think that it would be fitting for her to announce your recovery"

"She really said I was a priority?"

"Yes. Now, as Rose said, eat, shower, and then talk. I am going to talk to your Healer about getting you transferred to the hospital wing now that you are awake"

"That would be great, Professor. Thanks for letting her out of school to stay with me, it was nice waking up to hearing her voice."

"I couldn't have forced her back into Hogwarts if I had tried" McGonagall smiled. "I shall leave you now to go and find that Healer. I shall hopefully speak to you again very soon, Scorpius"

"Thanks, Professor" Scorpius said as the Headmistress walked out of the ward, leaving him to his thoughts.

* * *

15 minutes later, Rose walked back in carrying a tray of toast, pumpkin juice and a few croissants. "I just walked into McGonagall and she said that you can be transferred to the hospital wing tomorrow if you feel up to it. She said that even if you're on school turf, I don't have to go back into lessons until you do."

"That's great, we can go back to school! But can we talk everything over now?"

"Ok, well I wanted to apologise for you having to put up with me being half your height and also being completely impossible to work around and putting your NEWTs at risk because you spent so much time playing with me" Rosie laughed as she buttered a piece of toast.

"It's fine, it was fun having you around, I had an excuse to act like a child" Scorpius joked as Rose handed him the toast.

"I want to thank you for letting me share your bed as well. Not many people would do that"

"It was that or have you wake me up at 3am screaming" Scorpius said offhandedly.

"Well, I wanted to talk about that as well…I didn't have any nightmares last night. And that's the first time I haven't besides the other nights I spent with you, and well…as awkward as this is asking…"

"You're welcome in my bed any time" Scorpius winked as she blushed.

"I don't think there's much else for us to talk about really then"

"Why? I had loads of things I need to apologise for"

"No you don't! You had a small girl thrown into your care for 5 months and ended up treating her as if I was your own child! Why would you need to apologise?"

"I just…I don't know, I guess I feel I should apologise for having me as your carer when you could have done a lot better with your family or someone else"

"I wouldn't have picked anyone else, Scorp, you were perfect for me. You still are"

"Rose, what do you smell in your amortentia? As a 17-year-old, I mean"

"Well, it's not much different. Chocolate, new books and something else that I could never figure out"

"Still not figured it out?"

"Oh, I figured it the second I smelled it at 5 years old; it's you, and always has been. I guess I've just always loved you, but never known it" she ducked her head to try and hide the ferocious blush creeping up her face.

"Can you remember what I said I could smell?"

"New books, soup and something you couldn't figure as well"

"That something's your perfume. I could smell it lingering on you when you slept next to me last night. I think I love you, Rose Weasley"

"Well, that's lucky isn't it, because I'm absolutely certain I love you too" she smiled, before leaning down to kiss his cheek.

"Call that a kiss?" Scorpius smirked, before gently pulling her lips to his.

* * *

**A/N: Awwwwwwwh this has been so long coming, but A KISS! Thank you so much to everyone who has reviewed, they really make this story worth writing! Keep reviewing! - Rxx**


	33. Chapter 33

**In the previous chapter…**

"Well, that's lucky isn't it, because I'm absolutely certain I love you too" she smiled, before leaning down to kiss his cheek.

"Call that a kiss?" Scorpius smirked, before gently pulling her lips to his.

* * *

Rose and Scorpius spent the rest of the day talking, laughing and playing chess, just like they had done early in September. Draco found them fast asleep, wrapped in each other's arms, when he came the next morning. He found a note on the table by the bed which read:

_Dear Miss Weasley and Mr Malfoy,_

_I came along earlier to take Miss Weasley back to Hogwarts to announce Mr Malfoy's recovery, but found you both asleep, so thought it best to leave you to rest. Mr Malfoy will be transferred to Hogwarts tomorrow at lunch, so make sure that you are both ready. Hopefully the two of you can announce Mr Malfoy's successful recovery at dinner tomorrow, if Mr Malfoy feels up to it. You may also announce the suspension of Melody Partridge for bodily harm towards the Head Boy._

_I hope to see you tomorrow at lunch for the transfer. Enjoy your sleep,_

_Professor McGonagall_

Draco looked up to find that Scorpius was awake and gently running his hands through the sleeping Rose's hair.

"Hi dad" he grinned.

"How're you doing?"

"I'm doing okay. Everything still hurts, but my headache keeps getting better with more sleep."

"That's good. Have you read this?" Draco asked, handing the note to his son, who quickly read it.

"Nope…Oops. Rose isn't going to be overly happy that McGonagall walked in on her sleeping on me again" he chuckled. He saw his dad's eyebrows rise. "Rose seems to like sleeping next to me. If it stops the nightmares I'm happy" he looked down on the girl, who was slowly waking up.

"How is she doing? She's been through a lot"

"Rose is doing alright, I think. She was a bit upset by everything yesterday but I think she's calmed down a lot now she can see that I'm fine."

"You won't be fine if you talk any louder" they heard her mutter. She sat up next to Scorpius when she heard the two men laughing. "Hi, Mr Malfoy, ummmm sorry I fell asleep on your son"

"Again" Scorpius helpfully added.

"Again" she sighed, rolling her eyes at the boy by her side.

"Please, call me Draco" the older man smiled.

"So what were you talking about?" Rose asked. Scorpius gave her the note to read. "You're kidding, she found us asleep again?" she said exasperatedly. "Oh no! We only have a few hours before we have to be ready to go!"

"Oh yeah. That part didn't quite register in my brain. Dad, could you possibly get me some clothes from the Manor seeming as I need to be up? I think I'd rather be in trackies and a tshirt when McGonagall comes instead of these hospital gowns. They're so uncomfy" Scorpius said, picking at the flimsy material.

"Of course. I just wanted to check that you were alright. I can't stay long when I get back, so I can help you get ready to go but that's about it I'm afraid"

"Thanks for coming, Dad. Is mum away on business again?"

"How did you guess? I'll go get those clothes then"

"See you in a second, Dad" Scorpius smirked as Draco walked out of the room.

"We're going back to Hogwarts!" Rose said happily.

"You won't be that happy when you realise how much you have to catch up on" Scorpius laughed. "I'll help, don't worry" he smiled as Rose's face contorted with worry.

"You know, your face looks a lot nicer when you smile"

"I do smile, don't I?"

"Yeah, but you smirk a lot too, and the smile looks better" Rose grinned before kissing him on the lips. This was followed by another kiss. And another.

* * *

Draco apparated into the room with a pop and threw the clothes at Scorpius to break the pair apart.

"Save that for when I'm not here, yeah?" he smirked as the two teens pulled apart, surprised.

"But you weren't here a second ago, so we were fine" Scorpius smirked back.

"Shut up and get dressed" Draco laughed as he walked over to help his son up and out of the bed so he could change. Scorpius picked up an extra tshirt.

"Dad, you bought an extra by accident"

"No I didn't. I thought Rose might want a change of shirt seeming as she hasn't got any spare clothes with her so I picked up one of your smaller shirts for her."

"Thanks, Draco" Rose beamed, grabbing the shirt from Scorpius' hands.

"I have to go, but see you soon" Draco said before turning to leave. At the door, he turned and said "Rose, give him a hand before he falls over" and then left.

Rose turned to see that Scorpius was trying to pull up the trackies, but was having little success as he tried to keep himself balanced. "Let me, you idiot" she grinned. She gently pulled the baggy tracksuit trousers over the thick dressing on his leg and then settled the waistband on his hips. She stood up so that she could look him in the eye.

"It's horrible" he said, looking down at his now covered leg. "I hate having my leg all bandaged up"

"It'll be fine. They'll chuck you some crutches and you'll be back to normal in a few weeks"

"I won't be able to play Quidditch"

"You wouldn't have been able to play anyway – a double head injury in the same place usually means suspension from sport for at least 6 months, so your head alone would have stopped you being able to play." Scorpius groaned at this. "Don't groan, it means that you won't get hurt more and you can come and sit with me in the staff seating!"

"You won't be playing either?"

"I got replaced when the team found out I was going to be 5 for the majority of the season. So now I'm back, I decided they could keep their replacement as I would have quit soon because of the NEWTs anyway."

"We'll still beat you"

"I'd like to see you try. Now can you explain to me exactly why you support the Chuddley Cannons?" she smirked, holding up the bright orange shirt in her hands.

"I thought you liked them as well?"

"Oh no, that's Dad and Hugh, they love them. Hollyhead Harpies all the way for me. So yes, explain to me why you support the orange idiots?"

* * *

**A/N: Hi again! for some reason, updates are coming faster than usual. i think it has something to do with me having the time off of work...anyway, hope you are enjoying it and so on, keep reviewing and THANK YOU! to all of those who have followed from the beginning! - Rxx**


	34. Chapter 34

**In the previous chapter…**

"Oh no, that's Dad and Hugh, they love them. Hollyhead Harpies all the way for me. So yes, explain to me why you support the orange idiots?"

* * *

McGonagall apparated into the room to find Rose and Scorpius playing chess at a table by the window. Just as she walked over, Rose's King yelled "CHECKMATE!" as Scorpius' King toppled.

"That's another win to me" she grinned before turning to McGonagall.

"Are you ready to leave?" McGonagall asked.

"Yeah, we're ready. Sorry we missed you last night, Professor" Scorpius said as he scooped up the chess pieces and packed them into their box.

"It's quite alright. You two needed your sleep anyway. Now, I have spoken to the Healer and she has said that you may recover in the Head Dormitories instead of the Hospital Wing if you would prefer. She has also handed your case over to Madam Patil, who will evaluate you when you arrive."

"I can stay in my room? That's great! How long do I have to stay bedridden?" Scorpius beamed.

"As long as Madam Patil sees fit. If you are lucky, you could be allowed to walk around the castle tomorrow"

"Okay. Well, we're ready to go" Rose said. "Are we apparating to Hogwarts?"

"Yes. The Healer has just discharged you, so if you could both place your hand on my arm, we can leave" McGonagall said, holding out her arm to the two teens.

* * *

The three arrived in the hospital wing with a sharp pop. Scorpius' legs instantly buckled from the weight of landing on his feet. Luckily, Madam Patil was stood there waiting and held him upright.

"It's good to see you again, Mr Malfoy" she said as she helped him towards one of the examination beds. "Now, if you would sit perfectly still for 30 seconds, I will run my tests and then you are free to go." Madam Patil ran her wand over his injuries, scanning them for recovery statuses. She smiled as her wand glowed yellow.

"I'm guessing yellow is good?" Rose asked.

"Yellow's good" Patil smiled. "It means that you're recovered enough to resume normal life. So I'm going to get you a pair of crutches and as long as you're always with someone, you're free to go. I would recommend that you resume lessons no sooner than Monday, but you are free to walk around the castle" she said.

"Do I have to go back into lessons, Professor McGonagall?" Rose asked the Headmistress as Madam Patil disappeared to find crutches.

"No. Stay with Scorpius and catch up on the work you have already missed. I will have the teachers set aside your work for the rest of this week as well as the things from the last 2 weeks" she said. "I shall see you both at dinner" she smiled. "Oh, and Rose, sit with Scorpius. And if anyone says anything about sitting at the wrong table, send them to me. We are not about to have another brawl."

"What does she mean, another brawl?" Rose turned to Scorpius.

"You wouldn't know this, but when my head got bashed in the last time, everything turned into a fight once I'd been taken to the Hospital wing and you'd been brought along" Scorpius tried to explain.

"Oh. Yeah, we definitely are not gonna have another brawl."

"Rose, this is really out of the blue, but when you said you loved me…" Scorp suddenly asked quietly.

"I meant it, Scorp. I wouldn't have said it if I didn't. My family and your friends filled in some of the gaps for me and well, I guess I finally saw the kind, caring and loving guy underneath the Malfoy smirk" she joked. "Seriously though, I know it seems really rushed but everything kinda feels right with you. I think what did it for me was the risk of losing you again. Considering I wasn't told anything, I didn't know if you would actually get better this time" Rose admitted.

"Someone once told me that you only truly know if you love someone if there is the risk that you may lose them. I think it was Mum who said that, but I totally understand what she meant now" she smiled.

Madam Patil then came into the room and handed Scorpius a pair of crutches. "Now, if anything starts to hurt, sit down until it goes away. If it still hurts after 10 minutes of sitting, tell someone to come and get me. Don't walk around for too long at one time and don't strain your brain in lessons. I'm sure you will be fine, Mr Malfoy. Now, if I were you I would head down to the kitchens and see if the house elves can get you some food" she smiled as she dismissed them.

* * *

Rose walked slowly alongside Scorpius as he limped along the corridors on his crutches. Luckily, it was lunch, so there weren't many people around to see the head boy at his worst.

"Do you wanna brave lunch in the Hall? I know Madam Patil said to go to the kitchens, but I think we can make lunch. There's still half an hour left and the Hall's just round the corner" Rose asked.

"If you want to, I don't mind" Scorpius said as he adjusted to walking with crutches again.

"Let's go for lunch then. End of the Slytherin table?"

"Sounds good to me"

McGonagall stood as she watched Scorpius hobble in with Rose at his side. Slowly, all the heads in the great hall stopped talking and turned around to stare. For a moment, the only sound was the click of Scorpius' crutches hitting the floor as he made his way slowly to the end of the table.

And then everyone broke into applause. Scorpius, now sat at the table, watched as his friends and all of Rose's family rushed up to them.

"It's great to see you back, Scorp" Leo said, sitting next to his friend.

"And it's good to see you again Rosie" Lily said as she leant down to hug her cousin. "I'm glad you're better, Scorpius" she smiled.

"Nice trackies" Lorcan and Lysander said in unison, grinning.

"Shut up" Scorpius laughed, swiping his hand towards them in a friendly slap. "I'm doing good, thanks guys, but leg still needs some healing and now the scar on my head is a tad bigger" he smiled.

"But it will go away, right?" Al asked.

"Don't think so. A re-opened wound like this usually scars permanently" Rose said, squeezing Scorpius' hand under the table in support. Although this action was missed by everyone else, Scorpius' eyebrows raised a notch and his head whipped round to look at Rose. She smiled as if it was the most natural thing in the world and carried on talking to her family.

After about 10 minutes of talking, their friends decided to let them eat, so Leo, Lorcan and Lysander sat opposite Rose and Scorpius whilst the Weasleys and Potters walked back to the Gryffindor table.

"So," Scorpius asked, "What have we missed?"

* * *

**A/N: I've updated so much recently even i'm surprised! Keep reviewing! - Rxx**


	35. Chapter 35

**In the previous chapter…**

"So," Scorpius asked, "What have we missed?"

* * *

The next few weeks were extremely hectic for Rose and Scorpius. Rose had 6 months of school work to catch up on, and most of the time, Scorpius would sit up with her until well into the early hours of the morning to explain things to her. They still shared a bed, considering that both of them had gotten used to the feeling of waking up in the other's arms over the time that Rose was a toddler.

It was fast approaching February 14th, Valentine's Day, and the school was hyped up for the Valentine's Ball, which the staff had organised as a treat. Rose and Scorpius left Transfiguration hand in hand.

Although Scorpius hadn't actually asked Rose to be his girlfriend, she's semi-consciously filled the role, and the couple were barely seen apart. McGonagall had even let Rose eat meals with Scorpius. The Headmistress had explained to Scorpius in private that she believed Rose was suffering from a few psychological and emotional attachment issues to him as a result from spending 6 months in close contact with him.

These new developments in the couple's relationship, and the rule bends that were being allowed, did not go unnoticed by the rest of the student body. Anyone who asked was simply told that it was none of their business rather forcefully by Rose's family or Scorpius. Scorpius had become rather close friends with the Weasleys and Potters, and when Rose had been sleeping off a bug one Saturday, he had explained to her family about the psychological strain she was silently suffering.

It was the weekend before the ball, and the students were allowed to go into Hogsmeade to buy dresses and accessories. Scorpius, Leo, Lorcan and Lysander however, were stuck inside the dungeons scrubbing cauldrons.

"Remind us why Rose set of the firework and blamed it on you?" Leo asked.

"Well, she said to me that after you three had exploded your potions, she thought that I should give you company in detention" Scorpius said with slightly gritted teeth. "Of course, her real reason was so that she can guarantee I'm not going to see her dress before Friday."

"I see that she's slowly returning to her normal sneaky, slightly unnerving Slytherin ways then?" Lorcan said, before his hand slipped and he went crashing into the floor.

"Yeah. But it's a good sign. She's recovered really well according to Madam Patil, but McGonagall still thinks she should see a psychiatrist about the attachment stuff" Scorpius frowned as the blue gunk stuck to the floor refused to budge.

"Is she refusing to go and see him still?"

"Yeah. Every time it's the same response. 'I don't have attachment issues, I'm fine' then puts her head back in a book"

"What's McGonagall planning to do about it?"

"She's going to get him to come to Hogwarts then schedule Rose in to see him during one of her frees"

"She'll run from him the second she realises" Lysander said

"I know, that's why they're locking her in and taking away her wand. And the worst part is, I have to stay in lessons, so she'll freak even more that I can't be there"

"But that's why she's seeing him"

"Exactly. I'm not too worried about it yet – he's not coming for another 2 weeks, so for now all I have to worry about is this ball"

"Aren't you opening the ball with the first dance?"

"He got forced into it by Miss 'I-Didn't-Open-Your-Ball-Like-I-Was-Meant-To-So-I' m-Opening-This-One-Instead' Weasley" Leo snorted a laugh.

"She specially asked McGonagall, so now I have no way of getting out of it" Scorpius said, mocking misery.

"At least she can dance. Imagine if you had to open it with someone who couldn't dance, you'd be a laughing stock for months" Lorcan pointed out.

"That's true. I just hope it goes alright…I've had enough of balls going wrong" Scorpius said, scrubbing at the blue gunk that seemed to be perfectly stuck to the floor. Lysander and Lorcan sniggered in unison. "Grow up, you two" Scorpius laughed, splashing water at them.

* * *

"So, Rosie, where's the boyf? Didn't lock him in your room did you?" Lily giggled as the girls walked along the street or shops.

"Nope, I landed him detention instead. Scrubbing the dungeons should keep him busy long enough" Rose grinned.

"No way! How'd you manage that?" Dom laughed. She and Victoire had met them in Hogsmeade to help them with the shopping.

"Put a firework in Ian Mundy's cauldron then loudly told him off for it. Professor Parkinson didn't take to kindly to it, so put him in detention with his merry band of miscreants, who's already managed to explode their own cauldrons" Rose explained.

"So, now that you've ditched the boyfriend, what're we doing about your dress?"

"I actually need to go and pick it up. You've seen it before, but I needed to get it altered" Rose explained as they walked into the Hogsmeade branch of Delacour's. Fleur Weasley was bustling around the shop, helping girl's pick out dresses. She came to them the second she saw them.

"My lovelies, what can I do for you today?" she beamed.

"I came to pick up, and we came to shop for Lils" Rose said.

"I'll grab your dress, Rosie, but I need to you to try it on so we can check the alterations" Fleur said before disappearing into the back room. She emerged with a sealed garment bag and practically pushed Rose into the changing room.

Rose slipped into the dress and left Fleur to do the back for her. All of the girl's mouths dropped as she left the changing room.

"Rose…is that?" Lily was speechless.

"Yeah, it's the dress I wore to Scorp's New Year's Eve Ball. Mum sent it over saying that if I got it lengthened it would be nice for the ball"

"You look drop dead gorgeous!" Dom smiled. "You've done a great job, Mum! But can I just suggest something as well? Can we make the skirt less poofy and also make the bodice tighter fitting? That way it'll be a tad more form fitting?"

"You should come work here, Dom, you have great ideas" Fleur said as she swished her wand. The bodice suddenly hugged Rose's generous curves, and the skirt clung more at her hips. Fleur waved her wand again, and the childish shoulder straps vanished, and the box-like neckline reshaped itself into a flattering sweetheart neckline.

"That's prefect!" Dom cried, clapping her hands together. Fleur beamed and then started trying to persuade her daughter to work with her whilst Lily started the help unzip the dress for Rose.

"You look amazing, Rose. He's gonna be drooling. And the best bit is, he's going to recognise the dress still. You're gonna need some serious body guarding otherwise you'll never finish your first dance as he'll try ravishing you on the spot" she grinned wickedly as she helped her cousin step out of the precious gown. She zipped it away in the garment bag as Rose got dressed and then they both went back to Fleur, who was beaming. She had obviously managed to force Dom into working at the shop.

"How much do I owe you, Fleur?" Rose said, grabbing her purse out of her bag.

"Nothing, Gab said to give it to you free of charge, providing you get a picture of Scorpius' face when he sees you in it" Fleur smiled. Rose none the less put 7 galleons on the desk and then walked out with Lily, who had decided on a dress, purchased it and had it tucked away in a bag.

* * *

**A/N: Hi y'all! I will try to keep updating regularly, but can't guarantee it - I have a busy few weeks coming up, with results day and my birthday (woooo!) and also with work and school starting soon as well. Hope you're enjoying it and why not try reviewing? It's become my latest hobby - it's really fun, i promise! ;) - Rxx**


	36. Chapter 36

**In the previous chapter….**

"How much do I owe you, Fleur?" Rose said, grabbing her purse out of her bag.

"Nothing, Gab said to give it to you free of charge, providing you get a picture of Scorpius' face when he sees you in it" Fleur smiled. Rose none the less put 7 galleons on the desk and then walked out with Lily, who had decided on a dress, purchased it and had it tucked away in a bag.

* * *

The girl's walked back laughing, and laughed even more as they walked through the entrance hall. They had timed their arrival perfectly, for they just arrived as Scorpius, Leo, Lorcan and Lysander left the dungeons sprinting as though their lives depended on it. They were all soaking wet, and had bubbled up their arms and faces.

The girls laughed even more as they watched Professor Parkinson run after them yelling, casting the odd spell at them as she chased them. She stopped in front of the girls, scowled and muttered cursed under her breath as she watched the four boy's disappear round a corner at the end of the corridor.

"What did the idiots do now?" Rose giggled.

"Water fight during their detention. Found them hurling bubbles at each other. Of course, they looked at each other and sprinted out of the door" Parkinson huffed.

"Don't worry, Professor, they'll be wishing they'd stayed for your lecture after Rose has dealt with them" Lily laughed.

"Got Mr Malfoy's posse wrapped around your little finger, have you Miss Weasley?" Parkinson grinned.

"I'll deal with them, Professor. They'll regret the day they ever started hurling bubbles" Rose said, trirling her wand in her fingers.

* * *

"Is this your idea of punishment?" Scorpius asked between gritted teeth from his seat next to his grinning girlfriend. Leo, Lorcan and Lysander joined Scorpius in glaring at the very smug girl.

"Yes. I think you'll learn from it" she smirked.

"Why red?" Scorpius sighed.

"Blue?" Leo rolled his eyes.

"Pink" Lorcan groaned.

"At least I got Slytherin green" Lysander beamed.

"Shut up" the other three boys growled, but their growl turned into laughter as Lysander's green hair turned into a Christmas tree.

"Ok, I prefer green" he muttered.

"Nah, the Christmas tree looks stunning" Scorpius laughed. "But why bewitch our hair different colours?" he asked Rose.

"You have 2 weeks to prove to me that you've learnt from starting a water fight in detention or I keep it permanent" she smiled. She neglected to tell them that the spell wore out after a month even if you didn't reverse it.

"Fine" the boys grumbled. They were the centre of attention that night when Rose dragged them in with their multi-coloured hair and plonked them down in the middle of the Slytherin table.

"You should've been in Slytherin" Leo muttered under his breath. He cried out as suddenly his hair started glowing neon. Rose smirked.

"Behave, Nott" she waved her wand in his face.

"Sneaky bitch" he muttered quieter this time, so that she didn't hear him.

"Nice punishment, Miss Weasley" Parkinson smiled as she walked past. The boys withered under her glare.

* * *

After dinner, Rose and Scorpius headed back to their common room.

"So tonight, we do the rest of that Charms homework then focus on catching up in Transfiguration?" Rose asked as they walked hand in hand.

"Yeah. Then I thought we could just chill and play chess or something" Scorpius said, running his hand through his Weasley red hair. "Rose, how do I prove to you that I've learnt my lesson?"

"You're the smartest person in our year besides me, you should be able to figure something out" she grinned.

"Okay, that was in no way helpful" Scorpius said, rolling his eyes as he saw Rose smirk, "But I have another question for you as well"

"Oh really?"

"I know that we have to go to the Valentine's Ball as head boy and girl, but would you come with me as my date instead?" he grinned.

His grin turned into a frown as Rose stopped walking, staring at him with an open mouth and wide eyes. The look of pure shock slowly turned into a small smile as she walked to catch up with him. She took his hand back in her own and smirked as she said "How bloody long do you take?"

"So I take that as a yes?" he grinned again.

"Yeah, stupid" she laughed before leaning up to kiss him.

* * *

**A/N: I know, it's a short chapter today, but I felt you needed an update of some form **** For anyone that wants to know, I got my GCSE results back and I passed everything with ewither A*, A or B **** -Rxx**


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